


Recurve

by Westgate (Harkpad)



Category: Marvel Avengers Movies Universe, The Avengers (2012), The Avengers - All Fandoms
Genre: Angst, Clint's Carnival Days, Drama, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, M/M, SHIELD, pre-avengers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-04
Updated: 2012-08-16
Packaged: 2017-11-11 10:52:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 26,810
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/477760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Harkpad/pseuds/Westgate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the FBI comes to Clint for help finding Barney Barton, who has been an FBI agent for 10 years and has mysteriously disappeared, the past Clint has tried to escape invades his life. Phil & Natasha are there to help him through in their own ways,  but when Barney's disappearance turns into something much bigger, Phil is sure Clint won't emerge unscathed. When Trickshot appears, Clint knows he won't escape unscathed. Rated Mature for one scene only. Discussion of past abuse. Pre-Avengers but after Phil and Clint begin an intimate relationship.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to the beta-genius of dysprositos, who is forever catching my passive voice and helping with ideas. Thanks to veritas6.5 for moral support.

**_Recurve: The end of the bow limbs that curve away from the archer when the bow is held in the shooting position._ **

“They gave you an award?” Natasha said, pouring herself more water from the pitcher on the mess hall table. It was clear she was holding back on laughter.

“Hey, at least there wasn’t a ceremony. It’s just for my record and, if I want, for framing,” Clint replied, smiling into his own glass. “Coulson’s threatening to frame it for my bathroom.”

“What did it say?”

“Clint Barton, Most Awesome Archer Ever.”

“No, really, what did it say?”

“You don’t think it said Most Awesome Archer Ever?”

“No.”

“Okay, you’re right, and it doesn’t matter what it says, ‘cause until it says that I’m not hanging it up anywhere.” Clint finished his drink in a gulp and stood from the table. “Sorry, gotta go scare someone for a while. Coulson wants me to break in a rookie agent for a couple hours on all the ranges.”

“Meet for sparring after?” Natasha asked, gathering her own things for the garbage.

“Sure. Seven?”

They agreed and went their separate directions, Natasha to a meeting and Clint to the range. He loved breaking in new agents. Coulson knew that but only sent a few his way. They tended to leave Clint’s tutelage feeling a bit…overwhelmed.

This one was a challenge, though. Cocky, actually very good at everything except the bow, and not very receptive to Clint’s natural chatter; he managed to give Clint a headache by the time they parted ways around six.

He let himself into Coulson's locked office through an air duct to grab some ibuprofen before meeting Natasha, and he sat down on the leather couch with some water to take the pills. He leaned his head back and closed his eyes. Just for a few minutes, he told himself.

He jumped when Coulson’s door opened sometime later.

Coulson looked startled, too. “Oh, Hey. Didn’t know you were in here.”

Clint leaned forward and rubbed his face. “Sorry. I needed something for the headache your junior gave me.”

Coulson grinned and closed his office door, shrugged out of his suit jacket and loosened his tie. He sat down next to Clint on the couch and put his hand on Clint’s neck and rubbed it gently. “Thought he might do that. Sorry I pawned him off on you, but I knew he was pretty good already and thought he could at least use a little comeuppance on the archery bits.”

“Didn’t faze him,” Clint said, ducking his head so Phil could have a better angle on his neck, and sighing as Phil found a sensitive spot. “He’s an arrogant son-of-a-bitch. He’ll be fine.”

Phil nodded and kept digging at Clint’s neck, leaning back after a few minutes and resting his hand on Clint’s thigh. “Better?”

Clint nodded. “Yeah, thanks.” Then he remembered his sparring appointment and sat up quickly. “Shit. I’m supposed to meet Nat to spar. What time is it?”

Coulson checked his watch. “It’s six forty-five, but you’re not meeting her.”

 “What? Why?”

“Because there are some people here from the FBI who want to talk to you at seven. I told them you were open. I was coming to call you when I came in.”

Clint turned and squinted at Coulson. “FBI? To see me? What the hell for?”

Phil shrugged and stood up, going over to his desk and pulling a piece of fax paper into his hands and reading, “A team of FBI agents will be arriving at SHIELD this evening at seven o’clock to meet with Agent Barton unless he is otherwise officially occupied. They will meet with him as soon after that as possible tonight if he is working at that time. Tell Agent Barton he may be asked for assistance and is expected to offer full compliance, understanding his SHEILD duties will be suspended with pay while he assists them. Signed, Director Fury.” Phil looked up from the paper and shrugged. “Not sure what they want, Clint, but you’re theirs if they ask, apparently.”

Clint stood and pulled the paper out of Phil’s hands, rereading it. FBI, what the hell. He’d never had any interaction with them before, and if it wasn’t an actual SHIELD assignment for them then what the hell was it? He didn’t know _anything_ about the FBI, hadn’t ever worked for them or known anyone who. . . .

Suddenly, the breath left his lungs and he sat down heavily on the edge of Coulson’s desk, actually feeling his knees weaken. His hand holding the paper started to shake and Phil was there in an instant, a worried look on his face.

“Clint?”

He looked up at Phil and back at the paper. “I think I know what this might be about.” He felt his chest tighten, and it was hard to draw a breath, and Phil seemed to be standing very far away. He felt Phil pull him by the arm over to the couch, though, settling him down again, and Clint laid the paper down next to him and pulled his arms tight to his chest, his right hand flexing involuntarily. He took deep breaths to steady himself. “What time is it?” He said, turning to Phil.

“Six Fifty-three. Clint, what’s going on? Are you all right?”

Clint closed his eyes for a moment, took a last deep breath and then stood, looking at the paper on the couch for a meeting room number. “I have to go.”

Phil stood again and moved to the door, partially blocking it. “Are you going to be okay going in there by yourself?”

Clint nodded. There was Phil. Not fishing for an explanation, just offering support. No wonder Clint needed him all the damned time anymore. “I’ll be okay. Sorry. It’s just. . . the only person I ever knew to be involved in the FBI was my brother, Barney. And he hasn’t actually spoken to me in twenty years.”

And he left without another word, forcing his feet to carry him to the meeting room, hoping this wasn’t as bad as he figured it must be for them to come fishing for help from an estranged  brother who was probably the one person Barney Barton hated most in the world.

Clint let himself into the meeting room with confidence, knowing that acting like a scared little brother wouldn’t get him anywhere with these folks. The three FBI agents stood when he came in, and were typical FBI agents, black suits and stern faces. He shook their hands and introduced himself, memorizing their names and looking at the table in front of him, where several files were stacked.

“Agent Barton, thanks for coming on such short notice,” the suit named Ackerman, a young-looking blond man, said.

“Director Fury said jump,” Clint replied with a shrug of his shoulders.

“This actually doesn’t have anything to do with SHIELD, Agent Barton,” said Agent Floyd, older and even sterner.

“It does if they’re paying me while I help you, I figure,” Clint said.

Ackerman nodded. “Yes, well. It might have to do with them if we don’t get a handle on it. So let’s get down to it, okay?”

Clint nodded.

“When is the last time you were in contact with your brother, Agent Barton?” said Agent Smith, who had been standing the whole time.  He had a quiet but firm voice and Clint looked up immediately.

“I haven’t spoken to him since I was seventeen.”

The men looked at each other and the quiet man spoke again. “We asked when you last had contact with him, Agent. Not whether you spoke.”

Clint sighed. “I haven’t had contact with him since I was eighteen. He tried to get me to join the Army with him. Wrote me a letter.” He felt his hands clenching under the table as the memory of Barney’s letter was dredged up in a sterile boardroom amongst strangers.

“You didn’t go with him,” one of the agents said.

Clint was about to be sarcastic, but wisely thought better of it. “No. I wasn’t interested.”

“That was the last time?”

“Yes,” Clint couldn’t help the grimace on his own face. “He wasn’t happy with me. Left me another message telling me he’d be gone forever if I didn’t come.” Clint paused. “At the time I thought it was best if he were gone forever.”

The agent standing sighed. “So that was the end of it? Nothing else over the years?”

“No, nothing. You guys tracked me down for one of those phone interview background things when he was trying to join up, so I knew he was trying to be an FBI agent. He made it in?”

They nodded and the quiet man spoke again. “Yes, Agent Barton. He’s been an FBI agent for ten years. A good one, too, I might add. But he’s gone missing, and we don’t think it was related to the last mission he was on. We don’t know why he’s missing, but we can’t find evidence of foul play.”

Another agent interrupted. “We can’t find much evidence of anything, really. He just disappeared.”

Clint couldn’t help the mirthless laugh that escaped his lips at that point. “Yeah, he was good at that.”

The agents looked at each other. “We thought you might know him well enough to help us find him, Agent. We don’t really like to have our agents go off the grid abruptly. We’re concerned about him.”

“How can I help you? I don’t even know him anymore, much less his habits and patterns.” Clint needed this meeting to be over. He could feel his heart racing again, could feel his hands get sweaty and begin to shake.

“Agent Barton, we’re hoping you’ll go through these files tonight and see if you spot anything we’ve missed. We’re at a bit of a dead-end and thought that if there’s anything from your brother’s past that is evident here and in play, maybe you could see it.”

He just wanted out of the room, so he nodded and stood quickly. “Okay.” He started to gather the files from the table, but one of the men put his hand out and stopped him.

“Agent, we need you to do this here. These are highly classified files.”

Clint pulled his hand back. “Of course.” He felt a little stupid, but he was falling apart here and really didn’t want to do that in front of these men. “Can I go use the restroom and get a soda before I start reading, then?” They nodded and he stood again. “Thanks.” And he left the room, making a beeline for the nearest bathroom.

He leaned over the sink taking deep breaths, and he heard the door open behind him. He tried to pull himself together and he turned, expecting to have to make small talk, but it was Phil, putting his hand on Clint’s shoulder.

“Easy, Barton. It’s just me.” Clint closed his eyes and put his hands back down on the counter, flat, and lowered his head. “How’s the headache?” Phil asked.

Clint shook his head. “Fuck, Phil.” It was all he could think to say. He heard the water run in the sink next to his and heard Phil pulling paper towels from the dispenser. A moment later Phil pressed the damp towel into Clint’s hand.

“Here. Wipe your face and it’ll make you feel better. At least for a minute, okay?”

Clint took the towel and did what Phil said, turning and leaning back on the counter. After he wiped his face and heaved a few more deep breaths, he dug into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. He tugged out a couple dollars and held them out to Phil, ignoring the tremor in his fingers. “Can you do me a favor and go down and get me a huge soda? Whatever they have with the most caffeine. I’m gonna be up reading for a while.”

Phil nodded and took the money. He was gone a few minutes, and Clint managed to get his breathing under control and his face washed enough that they might not notice he’d practically hyperventilated. Phil ducked back into the bathroom with a huge cup and some change. He pressed both into Clint’s hand.

“Thanks,” Clint said. He took a deep drink.

“You looking at files?” Phil asked.

“Yeah. They need help finding someone. Think I can help.” He kept it vague. The word ‘classified’ had been spoken but he knew Phil knew who he was talking about anyway.

“Can you?”

Clint thought for a minute and took another drink before stepping around Phil and opening the door. “I hope to hell not,” he said. “I’ll call you later, or see you tomorrow morning.”

Phil caught Clint’s arm before he could get away. “Hey. Come to my place when you’re finished. Okay? You don’t have to talk about it, but come over. No matter what time it is.”

Clint looked at Phil’s eyes for a moment and then turned away and back toward the meeting room. “Okay,” he said over his shoulder. “Thanks.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Phil watches Clint start to go off the rails over what he found in the reports about his brother, Barney, and is determined to help him get back on track. That turns out to be harder than he could have imagined.
> 
> Phil didn’t move away from the door. This was not the way it was going to go down tonight. It just wasn’t. “Hold on, Clint. I didn’t say you were stupid. I asked if it helped. Come on, tell me what’s going on right now. You don’t have to give anything classified away, but what’s got you so upset that you shoot until your calluses are bloody? You’re right. You’re not stupid. You must have a reason.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I own nothing of the Avengers. Thanks again to my awesome beta, dysprositos.

Phil watched as Clint walked slowly back to the meeting room with his soda and shaky hands. He’d seen Clint rattled by ghosts before, but not like this. There was one time in the field with some madman from his circus days; god, his lover had ‘circus days,’ he thought wearily. But that one time was the only interference from his past that occurred at work. 

The rest occurred on his off days, and Clint always managed to reign in the ghosts before clocking back in for duty. Phil knew it sometimes took fighting them out or even, though rarely, drinking them out, but he always managed to keep the ghosts away at work. This one had him rattled to the core, it was clear. 

Phil went to look for Natasha in the gym. She was there, working a bag by herself, but she stopped as he approached. 

“Hey Coulson, did the rookie eat Barton? He was supposed to be here twenty minutes ago,” she said. She took a drink from the bottle of water he offered and leaned against the nearby wall. 

Phil gave her a small smile and leaned next to her against the wall. “No. Although, he did manage to give him a headache. He can’t meet with you though, Natasha.” 

He felt her straighten a bit at the use of her first name. First names were for off duty with her. 

“What’s going on?” she asked.

He ran his hand through his hair. “What do you know about Clint’s brother?” 

She stepped away from the wall entirely. “Not much. They don’t talk anymore. I don’t think Clint knows where he is. Why?” she asked, darkly. 

“There’s an FBI team upstairs questioning Clint about him right now. They want him to go through reports to try and help them find him. He went missing.” Phil knew he was filling in the blanks, but he knew he was right. 

“Wanna go get coffee after I clean up?” She said, walking away abruptly. 

“Yeah. Meet you at Joe’s in half an hour,” Phil said. 

Phil went to gather a few things to take home with him. He knew Clint would be a while, but he didn’t want to come back to the office after coffee, so he threw his briefcase of work in his car and then headed over to meet Natasha for coffee. 

“He was seventeen when he last saw him,” Phil said, stirring his coffee.

Natasha nodded and sipped her tea. “I think he talked to him or something once after that, though. He wanted to join the Army.” 

“I’m not sure, but he’s only mentioned him a few times to me.” Phil paused, considering the private information he had. Clint trusted Natasha, though, no matter what. “And only after a nightmare,” he said. 

She sighed. “Barney didn’t like Clint very much.” 

“He was a wreck tonight when he figured out what the FBI wanted,” Phil said. 

They sat quietly drinking for a couple of minutes. 

“So they want him to find Barney?” Natasha said.

Phil nodded. “And he told me he hoped to hell he couldn’t help them.” 

She sighed. “He could be dangerous. Add in the background he and Clint shared, and he could be very dangerous.” 

“But he was an FBI agent,” Phil said. “You don’t pass the background checks and periodic psych evaluations if you’re ominously dangerous.” 

Natasha chuckled slightly. “Not unless you’re really smart.” 

“True. And he is a Barton.” 

“He is a Barton. Speaking of, what’s the plan tonight after he’s finished over there?” Natasha said.

“I told him to get over to my place no matter what time it is. He agreed.” 

“Okay. Call me if you guys need help, and I’ll talk to him in the morning,” Natasha said. 

They finished their drinks and parted ways. Phil headed home to do some paperwork while he waited for Clint. 

When he woke up on a pile of papers at three in the morning, he realized things might be worse than they’d even feared. Clint wasn’t answering his phone, which meant he was either still working, or he’d ignored Phil’s request for him to come over. 

Either way, Phil wasn’t waiting any longer. He threw on his suit again and drove to SHIELD. He checked his own office first, hoping Clint had just decided to stumble to his couch and crash. It was empty, though, and so he went to the meeting room where they’d been working.

It was locked and dark. 

There was one more place to look before he drove over to Clint’s apartment or alerted Natasha. The range lounge was dark when Phil keyed it open, but there was a light on in the archery row. He opened the door and stepped in, scanning the room.

Clint was curled up small. Phil was always amazed at how small he could make himself when they were confined to a tight spot out in the field, and now, in the expanse of the archery rows, he looked tiny in the corner he had tucked himself into. He still had his shooting gear on, along with the jeans and black SHIELD t-shirt he'd started the day in, and he was hugging his knees to his chest. His shooting hand was bleeding and his eyes were shut, and he was rocking back and forth in the corner. There were two crumpled pieces of paper lying near his feet, and his bow and quiver were strewn on the floor a few feet in front of him. 

Phil approached cautiously, but when he quietly said, "Clint," the archer jumped, startled, and then tried to get to his feet with some semblance of calm. He ended up shoving his back against the wall and pushing himself up, moving to use his bleeding hand to steady himself, clearly forgetting the mess it was. 

"Shit!" he said, and stumbled to the side when he tried to avoid getting any more blood on the wall he’d been using for leverage. Phil moved and caught him in his arms. "Shhh, it's okay. I've got you," he said, and Clint sagged against him, resigning himself to just bury his face in Phil's shoulder as if he could tunnel away to a calmer place.

"Fuck, Phil," he said again, this time into Phil’s shirt, and Phil turned him bodily and let both of them sink the floor, leaning against the wall and wrapping Clint in a protective embrace. He was trembling in Phil’s arms, and Phil could feel his shirt getting wet, but he sat quietly, just holding him firmly, trying to anchor him in a safe place. 

They sat like that for a few minutes, and finally the trembling stopped and Clint pulled his head up and leaned back against the wall. 

“Can I see your hand?” Phil asked, gently reaching for Clint’s shooting hand. Clint wordlessly held it up and Phil gently undid the shooting glove and pulled it off. Clint winced and then sagged again, into his shoulder. Phil nudged him a little. “Hey, let’s go back to my office and get you cleaned up, okay? Then we can decide where to go from there.” 

“I have to be back here at eight anyway. I’ll just go to the general bunks and try and sleep a little,” Clint said. 

Phil decided not to argue with him yet. One step at a time. He extricated himself from Clint and said, “Stay here a minute,” and then stood, gathered the papers on the floor – old, handwritten notes or something, he noticed – and then picked up the bow and quiver and carefully put them away in Clint’s case, which was on a table nearby. 

Clint just watched him with glassy eyes. Then Phil went back and offered a hand, and pulled Clint to his feet, handing him the papers as he did. Clint stared at them for a moment, and then took them with his good hand and shoved them into his jeans pocket. Phil held Clint’s left arm gently as they walked, and he grabbed Clint’s case as they passed, carrying it for him. 

It was a few flights up on the elevator and down a long hallway to Phil’s office, and they made the journey in silence; Clint kept his head down, letting Phil lead him by the arm. When they got to the office, Phil led Clint to the couch, helping him sit, and then he closed the office door and went to the adjoining bathroom and gathered a couple of washcloths, a towel, and some antiseptic from the cabinet. When he went out to clean Clint’s hand, he saw that Clint had stretched himself out on the couch. 

He knelt down next to the couch and reached for the bloody fingertips, wiping them off gently with a wet washcloth, drying them, and then dabbing them with antiseptic. Clint winced when Phil applied the antiseptic and Phil tried to talk a bit. “Shooting yourself bloody. Did it help?” Phil didn’t think his tone was accusing, but Clint didn’t answer, and shot Phil a glare that took him by surprise. When Phil had the Band-Aids securely in place Clint stood, wavering a little but heading for the door. 

“I’ve gotta get some sleep. I’m sorry for causing you trouble tonight.” 

Phil was caught off guard. “Clint? Wait.” And he stood, quicker to the door than Clint was in his exhausted state, and he blocked it. “Stay here. Let me help you.” 

“What, by telling me I’m stupid for shooting so much? I’m not stupid, Phil.” His voice was filled with anger and sounded on the edge of hysterical. “I might do dumb things sometimes, but most normal people do. We can’t all be like you.” 

Phil didn’t move away from the door. This was not the way it was going to go down tonight. It just wasn’t. “Hold on, Clint. I didn’t say you were stupid. I asked if it helped. Come on, tell me what’s going on right now. You don’t have to give anything classified away, but what’s got you so upset that you shoot until your calluses are bloody? You’re right. You’re not stupid. You must have a reason.” 

Clint looked at him like he was going to argue, and then he clenched his eyes shut for a moment, took a heavy breath, and went back to the couch, crashing into it when he sat down and pulling his head down to his knees by his hair. Phil went and sat next to him. “Clint,” he said, quietly. “Talk to me.” 

Clint leaned back on the couch and reached into his front jeans pocket and pulled out the two pieces of paper Phil had seen on the floor earlier and handed them to him. “Read these, first.” His voice was ragged. 

Phil smoothed out the two pieces of plain white paper and there was a note on each of them, both in the same sloppy handwriting very similar to Clint’s.

The first read: 

Dear Clint,

Not sure this will find you in time, I’m counting on one of the new rowdies to find you for me, but I'm joining the army and think you should to. we could join up together and have some fun. They pay pretty good, and you and me'll have a leg up on those other punks figuring our circus experience especially you with your bow an me with my guns. I know you had it rough last year I thought you'd wanna get away and this is a good idea if you ask me. 

I'm going out in a couple weeks if you wanna come meet me in Des Moines at the train station on Wednesday two weeks out at 8 am sharp.

Barney

Phil read it silently and then looked over at Clint. He rubbed his eyes and gestured to the second one. It read: 

Hey Dumbass,

You think you’re done following me around, huh? I left before you got your ass kicked to hell and back so maybe you wanna reconsider how good you do on you’re own you ungrateful little shit.

If your done with me then your done. Don't ever expect to see my wise face again, little Hawk. I see you again and I'll kick you right back to hell where you belong. Your to stupid to see the long term benefits of joining up, that ain't my fucking fault. You ask Trick Shot about our long range plans and then see how smart you’re bein. But you don't get in. No way, little brother. Not now. Come see me in fifteen or so years and see how smart I was. I'm patient. I'm playing the long shot and I'll make it and you'll be nothing. Same as you nothing now. You think that hawk eye is gonna take you anywhere but to hell, your dumber than I even thought.

Fuck off, Clint. Your not my brother anymore.

Phil took a deep breath to steady himself after he read the second note. He read it twice and then laid the paper on the edge of his desk. He turned back to Clint. He was sitting forward, leaning his head on his knees, his arms wrapped around the back of his neck. 

He spoke, and his voice was muffled by his jeans. “They wanted me to help find him. As soon as I started going back through their files I saw what he was doing. I knew what he was doing, what they were doing, and it was all there in those goddamned files. But they didn’t know what they were looking at and I did.” Suddenly he stood and began pacing Phil’s office, arms wrapped around his chest, talking frantically.

“They’re doing it like Trick Shot said they would and I know it, Phil. And now I have to show them how to bring those guys down and Fury’s going to want me in on the takedown because of what it is and I don’t know if I can do it, I don’t know if I can bring him down but I hate him and he hates me and he. . .” Clint drew a sharp breath and stopped pacing. “He thought I was an idiot and he fucking left me, Phil! He left me for dead and he didn’t come for me like a brother should but now all I can think of doing is sneaking out and finding him and telling him to run like hell, all I want to do is go to him like family should and warn him but I can’t. He’s bad blood, and he’s always been bad blood, and I hate him, but he's my fucking brother!” 

He threw himself back down on the couch and held his head in his hands, fighting the tears. They didn’t come, and Phil watched as Clint tried to compose himself with ragged breaths and his hand across his face. Phil leaned over and pushed Clint gently back down to lying on the couch, and he reached down and pulled Clint’s shoes off and pulled the blanket over him.

Phil knelt down at the edge of the couch again and laid his hand against Clint’s cheekbone and said, “Okay. Let’s get some sleep and look at it again when you wake up, all right? We’ll look at it again in a few hours and maybe we can figure some way for you to do what the FBI needs but not go along for the takedown, okay? Or something else, but we can’t figure it out right now. It’s too close and you’re too tired. Sleep, and I’ll wake you at seven in time to meet them and we’ll figure it out then. Okay?” 

Clint just nodded and bit back more tears that were threatening, and he rolled over. Phil just sat and stroked his hair until his breathing evened out and he was asleep. Then Phil stood up and moved to his chair. A few hours sleep at his desk was nothing new, and he was asleep a minute after he set the alarm on his phone, texted Natasha to come by at seven, and sent a very private email to Director Fury.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clint shares his discovery with the FBI and plans are begun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to dysprositos for beta magic.

At six-thirty Phil’s phone alarm sounded and he got up and went to take a shower, relishing again the perks of his position and the private bathroom it got him. When he was finished, he pulled on his spare suit and stepped back into his office to find Clint sitting up on the couch, staring blankly into space. He went and sat down next to him. 

“Hey, do you want to go take a shower? Natasha’s coming by in a few minutes with coffee and breakfast sandwiches.” 

Without a word, Clint just nodded and shuffled off to the bathroom. Phil dug one of his own SHIELD t-shirts out of a desk drawer and tossed it in on the sink for Clint and then went back to his desk. He opened his email and found a reply from Fury. “Fine. FBI lead says Romanov can run an assist and you can consult. I have no intention of losing him on an FBI case.” Phil smiled to himself and pulled out the necessary paperwork.

Soon there was a knock on his door and Natasha was standing in the doorway with a bag of sandwiches and three cups of strong coffee. He ushered her in and she sat down on the couch.

“He’s taking a shower,” Phil said, nodding toward the bathroom.

“How is he?” she asked.

Phil shrugged. “Hasn’t said anything this morning. I found him on the range with a bloody hand at three-thirty. He didn’t know which way was up at that point. I’m hoping some sleep helped him.”

“Did you hear from Fury?”

“Yeah, we’re in. It’ll help.” 

Clint stepped out of the bathroom pulling his t-shirt on over his damp hair and sagged onto the couch next to Natasha. “Hey, Tasha.” He leaned into her shoulder. He was glad she was here, although it didn’t help the nausea that arrived while he was showering. Bringing him coffee wasn’t going to make deciding what he had to tell the FBI agents any easier. 

“Hey Barton,” she said, pushing him away so she could see his face. “You okay?” 

Clint sighed and leaned forward for a coffee. “I will be. The suits threw me for a hell of a loop last night, though. Did Phil tell you?” He looked over at Phil, who gave a small shrug.

“A bit,” she said. “Told me he managed to get me assigned for an assist and him assigned as a strategist for the case.” 

Clint’s hand holding the coffee dropped and he almost spilled his drink, “Shit!” he said as he straightened the cup and set it on the table roughly. “Phil? Really? You guys are working it with me?”

“Fury sent the approval from him and the FBI lead an hour ago. I figured that’d be a start to figuring things out, right?” 

Clint rubbed his hand over his face. “Yeah. It would, yeah. Thanks,” he said, quietly. Oh god, he wasn’t going to have to face them alone. He didn’t have to do this alone. He felt some of the weight of the last night leave his shoulders and he sagged back against the couch. 

“Okay,” Natasha said, “We don’t have a lot of time before we’re expected in the meeting. Why don’t you tell us what we have to know beforehand?” 

He thought for a minute. What they had to know. Well, he could make this simple. He should, too. As much as he loved the two people sitting here more than anyone else he’d ever loved, he didn’t need to complicate things for them. They didn’t need every single little piece of his shitty baggage. Just the big ones, he thought with a grimace. 

He took a deep breath. “Okay. Trick Shot was my mentor on the circus. Buck Chisolm is his real name and he’s the one who taught me how to shoot.” Clint paused, remembering himself as an eager twelve year-old the first day he held a bow in his hands; it was one of the best days of his life. “He was good. Another guy, Duquesne, needed to spice up his Swordsman act and they all decided that my shooting would be the spice.” He couldn’t help the bitterness in his voice. 

"Anyway," He looked at Phil. “You read the second letter last night. Barney had something set up with Trick Shot. I couldn’t. . .I wasn’t interested in finding out at the time, so I didn’t ask what those long term plans were. But Trick Shot left the circus not long after Barney left for the Army and I left not long after that. And Trick Shot went really bad. He tried contacting me once or twice, trying to lure me into his businesses, whatever they were, but I coul--wouldn’t go near him.” He felt his voice get ragged when he thought about his former mentor so he stopped and took a drink of coffee. Natasha put her hand on his back and rubbed softly while he continued talking.

“That was it. Really, when Barney left and told me to fuck off I did. I never heard from him again and after Trick Shot tried a few times over a few years to pull me in, he left me alone, too.” 

“What did you see last night, Clint?” Phil asked, softly.

Clint shuddered involuntarily. “Patterns. Set-ups. A territory being mapped out and contacts being set up and deals being made. They’re not in the reports, but –“ he broke off and stood abruptly, feeling his heart begin to race again just thinking about it. He clenched his fist and turned to his friends and colleagues. “Barney’s smart. Trick Shot was smart, too. Neither one had an education, but Barney worked his way through college after the Army and before he joined the FBI, I’ll bet he was working with Trick Shot even then. He said he was patient, Phil . . . .” He trailed off as he suddenly got lost remembering promises of beatings that would linger for days, sometimes weeks, and Clint wouldn’t know when they were coming, so he couldn’t get away, and …He felt Phil’s hand on his arm. He was standing next to Clint, worrying again.

“Sorry,” Clint said, pulling away from Phil. “He’s patient. Always was. He wasn’t kidding. Whatever it is he’s planning, he’s been working on it for years. Ten years with the FBI and years of planning before that.” 

“And you can see it, though?” Natasha asked, finishing her coffee. 

“I think so,” he said, nodding at her. “I . . . I need a map, Phil. For the meeting.” He knew it was almost time to go, so he took a deep breath. “I’ll explain my theory to everyone.” He paused. “It’ll help having you guys in the room.” 

Natasha and Phil settled themselves into chairs in the meeting room and Clint went to the wall and hung up the map of the US that Phil had wrangled from a junior on the way up. He had a box of push-pins, too, and he turned back to the notes he’d left in the room last night. He put push-pin after push-pin in the map and after he got about fifteen in, the FBI agents arrived. He stood next to the map, feeling his rushing heartbeat; damn if he wasn’t going to have heart problems when this fucking assignment was over. He shook hands with the agents again and put the last few pins on the map and they sat down, looking at him expectantly. 

He looked at Phil for a moment, and when Phil gave him a subtle nod of support and a wink, he took a deep breath and began the conversation that would bring his brother down.

Phil watched Clint with admiration as the younger agent spoke. He had clearly found something, and there was no evidence that he found what he was explaining troubling. Phil was sure the FBI agents who didn’t know Clint wouldn’t notice the clipped, formal tones of a man trying to stay in control of his emotions and he was sure he and Natasha were the only ones who saw the slight shake of his hands as he passed out copies of his notes and began to explain. 

“With all due respect, Agents, he’s been playing you,” Clint said as he stepped over to the map. Phil watched as the agents sat forward in their chairs and collectively scowled at the accusation. Clint might be in control, but he wasn’t always tactful when explaining things to others who missed something. 

“When I was eighteen he wrote me a letter and said that he had long-term plans with a known criminal. He wrote that he could be patient and I was missing out on a huge opportunity by not going with him. When he joined the FBI he started pursuing Buck Chisolm, the criminal known as Trick Shot, right?” 

One of the agents nodded and said, “Yes, and we knew he had known this man when you two were young. He had inside information and pursued him relentlessly. He said he wanted to put him behind bars for what he’d done to you.” 

Phil saw Clint clench his fists when the agent said that, but he recovered quickly and just nodded. 

“He and Trick Shot were working together. He told me they had long-term plans, and if you look at the map you can see them. Here,” he said, pointing at a pin in Des Moines, Iowa. “This was his first job, and if you look at the map of places he pursued Trick Shot, there’s a definite territory being worked out.” 

“Wait, Agent Barton,” One of the suits said. Phil watched as the man leaned forward. “You’re suggesting that your brother made plans with this man before he even joined the Army and then didn’t carry them out until fifteen years later?” 

“Yes, sir. He’s capable of that.” 

“Do you still have the letter that indicated the start of this partnership?” another man asked.

Clint paled. “Why?”

“Because you’re leveling a harsh allegation on a ten year agent of the FBI, Agent Barton. The pattern you’ve shown us might be clear, but the motivation isn’t. We’d like to see the letter.” 

Phil hadn’t wished someone to lie in a long time, but he wished it here. He wanted Clint to tell the men it was destroyed or he didn’t have it or his dog ate it last night. Anything. But he knew when Clint’s idealism showed up and he knew it wouldn’t leave. 

“No,” Phil said, leaning forward in his chair. 

“Excuse me, Agent Coulson?” the lead FBI agent asked.

“The letter is private and I’ve read it. I’ll vouch for what he’s saying. Barney Barton did say that he had made plans with Trick Shot and that Agent Barton was missing out on a long-term opportunity.” 

The suits looked at each other and then the lead nodded. “All right. For now we don’t need to see the letter.” 

Phil met Clint’s eyes and nodded shortly; he could see gratefulness there. Clint went on.

“Look,” he said, passing around another piece of paper with a list of locations, and another list of words down the side of the page. “If you notice, each location has a word next to it. These words were in some of Barney’s reports, one per report and not necessarily all in one spot – they were like a word jumble inside the report, but once I found one I knew to look for more. They would have meant little to you, but they were his way of keeping track of where they were in the process.”

Phil looked down at the column of words and read down the page. He looked up at Clint incredulously when he finished. Clint just shrugged at him with a small smile on his face. Phil looked back down at the page. Running down the right side next to case sites were the words: ANNIE OAKLEY, BIG TOP, BANNER, CHERRY PIE, FIREBALL, GUYS, HAUL, FIRST OF MAYS, SCREAMERS, LOT LICE, ROUSTABOUT, ITCHY FEET.

“What do these mean?” Natasha asked, and Phil could hear a hint of awe in her voice and he knew that Clint pulling things that could catch her off guard always made her very happy. 

Clint looked at the FBI Agents. “They’re circus terms. An Annie Oakley is a free pass – that was in his very first report. Big Top, that refers to the even they’re planning – the main event. The Banner is the poster, the sign, the announcement for the event.” 

“Cherry Pie?” Phil asked with a grin. “What’s that?” 

“Extra work. Folks went looking for cherry pie when they were broke.” Clint took a deep breath. He pointed at the map. “A Fireball is a swindling circus – probably when he hooked back up with Trick Shot here. Guys are actually ropes that pull the tents up. Judging from the op this report came from he probably gathered some tools, some items to help them with what they’re doing.”

One of the agents piped in, “Is a haul the same as in a bank haul?” 

Clint shook his head, “No. It’s the moving of the tent from the train to the empty lot for set-up. The process. This one was a huge sting, right? It was probably the turning point. Lots of contact possibilities in that operation, from what I could tell, the turning point. Plus, the other terms after that op, they’re about getting started. First of Mays are new workers who are on their first circus. Screamers, that’s a little…wait, no. It’s the music they play, the marches, to start the show. Yeah, a beginning. Roustabouts are workers, it’s about setting up shop now.” He paused, and Phil saw him close his eyes for a moment. 

“Agent Barton?” one of the suits prodded. 

“Yeah. Sorry. Um, Lot lice, see, that was us.” He looked back down at the papers. 

“What do you mean, Agent?” 

He sighed. “Lot lice. Kids who grew up in the circus. And itchy feet is a circus guy’s need to return to circus life after a time away.” He drew a hand across his face. “Barney was a circus kid ready to go back to Trick Shot.” 

The room was silent, and Clint took a drink of the glass of water in front of him. 

Phil said, “He didn’t disappear. He left.” And Clint nodded.

“Why?” Natasha said, after a moment.

Clint looked up and Phil saw his hands clench around the glass of water.

One of the FBI agents answered, “If he’s working with Trick Shot then he’s dealing in weapons.

Phil said, “Agent Barton, did every report have a code term in it?” 

Clint said, “No. He did his share of average operations. The circus terms are key points, I think. Look,” he said and he stood up again, moved to the map. He pointed at the first place where a term showed up in the report. “We need to correlate anything that went down after the incident Barney was involved in there. He wouldn’t be stupid enough to try and pull something when he was actually working an op there. It would come after. A month, maybe two. He’d be using the FBI position for insider information and resources, then he’d be moving.” 

Agent Ackerman spoke up. “We can run some reports and see what we come up with. Look for unattributed events. See where Barton was when those happened.” 

Phil watched as Agent Smith, the leader, looked at Clint and thought for a moment. 

As Smith started to speak, Clint said, “Wait. There’s something else you should look for in your reports.” 

“What?” Smith said.

“You need to be looking for an image. I don’t know if he’ll use it, but he might. It was . . . important to us early on. If he’s leaving any kind of mark, which those types tend to do, it might be one of two things.” He leaned over the table and grabbed a pencil and paper. He bent over it and sketched while everyone sat silently and watched him. 

Finally, Phil saw him close his eyes for a moment and then look up, passing the paper over to Agent Floyd, nearest him. 

“What are they?” Floyd asked.

“The one on the left is the carneys’ symbol for Carson’s, a block C with streamers at the ends. That’s the outfit we were with. The other is Trick Shot’s tattoo, a recurve bow woven through his knuckles. He might use that one,” Clint said. He threw the pencil down on the table a little too hard and leaned back against the wall with the map. 

Smith stepped forward. “Okay. We could all use a break, I think. Let’s take a couple hours to run some reports, see if our guys can add to what Agent Barton has given us. Then we’ll regroup and plan the next step.” He reached over and offered his hand to Clint, who took it hesitantly. “Thank you for your help, Agent Barton.” 

“Sure.” 

The FBI agents filed out of the room, leaving Clint standing against the wall with his arms folded over his chest and Natasha and Phil looking up at him. Phil was going to give him some space, even though he really just wanted to take him home and make him sleep. He had dark circles under his eyes and he was pale, and, after a moment, he sagged into his chair next to Phil. 

It was that moment that Director Fury chose to come into the meeting room. “Coulson, my office, now. Barton, my office in an hour and a half.” 

Clint groaned and Phil stood to leave. He swore he heard Clint ask Natasha to “please spar with me. Now.” 

An hour and a half later, Clint headed for Director Fury’s office. He was running on autopilot at this point; the breakfast he’d had five hours ago had worn off, his emotions were so ragged he could hardly feel anything anymore, and now his body was aching from getting his ass kicked by Natasha. He would be so fucking glad when this day was over. For now, though, he sat himself down in front of Fury’s desk and looked up at him expectantly. 

“Agent Barton, Agent Smith informs me that you’ve been a great help to them in trying to locate your brother. Good work.” 

Clint shrugged. He had to put up a front for the FBI agents. He didn’t have to put up a front for Fury. “Barney decided to leave a trail. He’s an idiot sometimes. I just found it because I was part of that world for a while and he wasn’t counting on anyone from that world following him.” Especially his stupid little brother, he thought to himself. 

“Yes, well, it was good work.” Fury leaned forward over his desk. “They want you in on the operation to bring him in.” 

Clint nodded and looked at the floor in front of his chair. “Yes, sir.” Bring him in. He loved doublespeak. 

“I want to know if you think that’s a good idea, Agent.” 

Clint looked up. That was unexpected. It was the kind of question Phil would ask in their planning sessions, not one that the Director would ask. 

His surprise must have shown on his face because Fury sat back with a small smile. “Agent. This is not a SHIELD operation. It is an FBI operation where one of my agents could get seriously fucked with, to put it bluntly. I want to know if you think it’s a good idea.” 

He knew what he wanted to say to save his own sanity. He knew what he should probably say for the safety of everyone else involved. What he did say was, “Yes, sir. It’s fine. I imagine I could be pretty useful to them if I go along.” 

Fury just nodded. “All right, Barton. Now. Coulson and Romanov. They’ll go with you because I happen to disagree with your assessment of the situation. I think it’s a horrible idea for you to go along. I think you’re on edge and unpredictable right now and you might just ruin everything for the FBI. But if Coulson and Romanov are along the chances of that go down, so they’re going. And you are to be third operative here, do you understand?” 

Clint nodded and felt a little bit of the weight on his shoulders release. Third meant he didn’t have any authority. Third meant he had to listen to Phil and Natasha and follow their orders. Third meant he didn’t have to make any decisions or be responsible for anything but what others ask of him during the op. He wanted to hug Fury. 

“You’re dismissed, Agent Barton. Make sure you get some sleep before you head out anywhere. You look like shit.” 

Clint grinned and stood up and left the office. It was time to regroup with the FBI agents, and after that meeting with Fury, he thought he might be able to handle the rest of the day. 

The rest of the day, however, surprised Clint. 

“He’s running weapons, for sure,” Agent Ackerman said, and he pulled up a screen with blank spaces for headshots corresponding with city names around the five states that Clint had identified as Barney’s territory. “Look. We have an identity for several cities – all of them the territory of Buck Chisolm, aka Trick Shot. The other cities are being supplied, but we couldn’t trace them. Those are his.” 

Weapons. He had figured out that his brother was a gun runner and serious criminal. It got worse. 

“The reports in these cities that Barney likely holds are just as ruthless, some more, than Chisolm’s territory. If Barney Barton is the one holding these places, then he’s wanted for more than thirteen murders in the last year alone.”  
Clint felt nauseous. He was reading through the file that Ackerman had handed out, reading about atrocities on top of murder. Barney was being accused of arson, burglary, kidnapping, torture, destruction of federal property, and, in the end, supplying guns to drug dealers and other criminals. Ruthless, indeed. 

Clint was lost in the folder, trying to bite back bile in his throat. He was beginning to get a sense of the criminal his brother obviously was and was trying to reconcile it with the boy who led Clint away from the foster home in the middle of the night, promising take care of Clint and lead him on a life of adventure and fun. That life had never come, and Clint did fall victim to Barney’s ruthlessness himself, but he never imagined it was anything but exaggerated sibling rivalry. It looked like it was more, now. 

“Agent Barton,” Smith called. Clint looked up and realized that he must have called his name before, judging from the look of concern on Phil’s face across the table.   
“Sorry,” he said, closing the file and laying it on the table. “I got distracted.” 

“Understandable,” the agent replied. “We need to figure out a way in.”

“A way in?” Clint felt fuzzy, like he was hearing things through a tunnel. 

“We need to catch your brother, agent. We need to figure out how to do that.” 

Natasha leaned over the table, pulling the file away from Clint. “We can infiltrate. I can. Agent Coulson can coordinate.” 

Clint looked at her in astonishment. “What makes you think you can infiltrate?” 

She gave him a hard smile. “Because Agent Ackerman here told me I was Barney’s type before the meeting started.” 

Clint looked to Ackerman, who had turned a bit red. “His type?” 

Ackerman sighed. “Look, I worked with him for a long time. I know what kind of girls he likes. He likes athletic girls on the shorter side. She’s tough, he’d like her.” He didn’t elaborate on why he felt the need to tell Natasha this before the meeting, but Clint could imagine trying to make small talk with her if you didn’t know her. If you knew her you didn’t try to make small talk period. 

“No,” Clint said.

“Why not? It might work,” Natasha said.

“Because there’s an easier way,” Clint said.

“What?” Coulson asked.

“I can be bait. If he catches wind of me he’ll . . .” Clint trailed off and looked back at the file in Natasha’s hands. 

“He’ll what, Barton?” Agent Smith said.

Clint looked up at the FBI agents. “He hated me. He’ll come to gloat and hurt me if he can. You guys can spring the trap when he does.” He shrugged his shoulders and leaned back in his chair, staring at the FBI agents and avoiding the penetrating glares that Natasha and Phil were both shooting at him. 

There was a long silence in the room. 

“Two options, then,” Agent Smith finally said. “Let our team run some scenarios tonight. We’ll reconvene tomorrow morning at 8am, sharp.” He nodded and suddenly that was the end of it. A team of FBI agents was going to sit around and decide whether it was Clint or Natasha that got to walk into the lion’s den to draw Barney out. 

Clint stood, stared at the file on the table again, and walked out of the room. He wasn’t going to need telling twice to get the hell away from this situation for awhile. He was dog-tired and every time he closed his eyes he saw Barney swinging at him like he used to do. He stopped outside the room and leaned heavily against the wall. Phil and Natasha approached him and she reached for his hand and held it for a minute as the three of them just stood there, unsure of what was next. 

“I don’t want you to do that, Tasha,” Clint said, wearily. 

“I know. But it might be the best way. Besides, you’re third on this, remember?” She said. 

“Yeah. But third doesn’t mean I have to like it. It’d be easier if I went. Quicker.” And if his brother harmed her he’d have to kill him, and he didn’t know if he could do it.

Phil stepped close. “They’re going to figure out which is best. We’re going to do our own figuring once all of us get a little sleep.” He looked at Natasha. “You go get some rest. We’ll meet you in my office at six-thirty tomorrow morning, okay? We’ll do some planning ourselves before we regroup with them.” 

She nodded. “Get him some sleep?” She gestured to Clint. 

Phil nodded and Clint gave her the best smile he could muster. “Thanks.” She nodded and left them standing alone against the wall. 

Phil stepped away and gave Clint a once-over. Clint felt a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I know that look.” 

“Yeah, you do. Now come on. You’re coming home with me and getting some sleep in a bed. No argument.” Clint just nodded and headed down the hallway with him. Sometimes taking orders was okay.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a short repose, things come to a head and the sting begins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to dysprositos for beta charms. Also, this chapter begins with some slightly explicit material - it's short, my first explicit scene ever, and I felt it was necessary to the story. Hopefully the chapter pleases all of you!

They walked into Phil’s apartment and Clint suddenly felt limp, like the rest of the world disappeared behind him. It’s what Phil’s place always did for him. It was like when he found a perfect spot in the rafters or ducts, it’s what being alone at the top of a building did for him. He could step through the door into Phil’s neat, orderly, and warm apartment and he was safe, free. It was another hiding place, but with the added bonus of Phil.

He didn’t know what to do with himself tonight, though, so he just stood in the entranceway after toeing his shoes off. He watched Phil take off his shoes and then his suit jacket and tie, laying the clothing across the back of his couch. Clint enjoyed the sight of Phil unbuttoning the crisp, white dress shirt and tugging the hem of it, along with his undershirt, out of the waist of his pants. This was Phil undone.

Watching this ritual was one of Clint’s favorite things ever because he knew he was the only one Phil allowed to see it. It was his. Phil turned, finally, and walked over to Clint, wordlessly and gently pulling Clint’s own t-shirt out of his jeans, running his warm hands up Clint’s sides and then cupping his cheek, leaning in and kissing him deep and slow. Any tension that was left in Clint’s shoulders melted away and he wavered on his feet. He felt Phil chuckle into his mouth and pull back, his blue eyes penetrating Clint’s with a soft smile.

“You’re dead on your feet,” he said, and reached for Clint’s hand, slowly pulling him down the hallway to the bedroom. “Come on.”

Phil steered him to the bed to sit him down, but Clint held on and pulled him down next to him on the bed, leaning over and pulling him in for another kiss. He felt desire and desperation fill his chest. “I need,” he said, kissing Phil’s mouth, neck, and chin, “I need this. You.”

Phil pushed back, ran one hand through Clint’s hair, and nodded, reaching down and pulling his own t-shirt off while Clint did the same. Clint leaned in, running his hands over Phil’s back, feeling his muscles, his scars, and his ribs, pulling him close and running his lips over Phil’s chest at the same time, catching his nipple in his mouth and biting softly. He wanted to feel as much of Phil as he could; wanted Phil to be all there was in the world.

Phil let him explore, running his own hands over Clint’s back firmly, pressing his fingers into Clint’s skin, almost hard enough to hurt, right on the edge of pain. He feathered kisses through Clint’s hair, pulled Clint’s chin back to his own, prying his tongue into Clint’s mouth  and exploring, gently reassuring him that he was safe, wanted, cared for.

Phil could feel Clint’s need for slow tonight. Often Clint needed fast, asked for rough, but tonight he needed to be shown some tenderness. He needed to be shown that he was safe, that things didn’t have to hurt, that he could feel something good. Phil kissed and caressed and then gently slid Clint’s boxers down and off, and pushed him back onto the pillow, flat. He knelt over top of him and kissed, up and down his body, up and down his cock, running his hands gently over his chest while he caressed Clint’s cock with his mouth, licking, sucking gently, listening to Clint’s moans and enjoying the sound of his own name falling from Clint’s mouth.

He leaned back up and kissed Clint under the chin, just at the top of his neck and Clint made the throaty groan that always made Phil lose touch with the sniper and find Clint, _his_ Clint, the one person who made it okay for Phil to lose control. He slipped his tongue back down Clint’s chest and wrapped his mouth around his cock and pulled harder, sped up the rhythm, took him all the way in, holding Clint around his waist as he bucked and lost complete control, coming a moment later with a cry and then deep, heaving breaths.

Phil swallowed and then moved back up, kissing his way up to Clint’s mouth, letting Clint pull his tongue in with his own, caressing his hair and running his hands back down Clint’s back until they pulled apart and Clint laid back, eyes closed and breathing evening out. Phil settled down next to him, throwing his arm over his chest and nestling his head into his shoulder. 

They lay like that until they both fell asleep.

Phil woke up at his usual internal alarm time of five o’clock, surprised. They had fallen into sleep early last night, probably before ten. That he and Clint had managed that much sleep in a stretch was unusual on any day, much less such an emotional day. He was glad for it. He got up and took a shower, and was drying off his hair when he heard Clint’s voice from the bedroom.

“No! Stop! You’re not him. . . . . you don’t have to be . . . Stop!”

Phil rushed out of the bathroom to find Clint thrashing in the sheets and crying out. He pulled him close, running his hand through his hair, saying “Clint. Wake up. Come on, Clint. Wake. Up.” He held him tight and finally Clint’s eyes opened, wide with panic, and he looked around, finding Phil’s eyes and holding them, nodding.

“Okay. I’m awake.”

Phil leaned in and kissed him, felt him trembling. “You’re safe.”

Clint pulled back, staring at Phil some more, still wide-eyed.  “Okay.”

“Are you sure you’re awake?”

“Yeah.”  Clint leaned back on the headboard and pulled his knees to his chest. “Yeah.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“What?”

“The nightmare. You said ‘you don’t have to be him.’ Was it Barney?”

Clint nodded. “Yeah. When we were kids he felt responsible. Said it was his job to look after me when our parents crashed.” He chuckled, winding his hands in the sheets again. “Which was bullshit. No one had been looking after either one of us for at least a couple years before that. But he said that when we got put in the system. They kept us together as often as they could and  . . . he kept me in line. When we ran away and were in the circus and had no one at all really looking after us he tried even harder to keep me in line.” Clint paused and shook his head. “Only way he knew how to keep me in line was the way our dad kept us in line. And that hurt like hell.”

“Did it work?” Phil asked, wondering how Clint could have come through all of that with such fierce loyalty and determination to do the right thing. He was seeing more and more over the past day how many chances Clint had passed on going down the horribly wrong path.

Clint laughed. “Nah. No one can keep me in line but you, Phil. You know that.” He leaned in and kissed him, and then unraveled himself from the sheets and stood. “Gonna take a shower.”

Phil fixed them both some coffee while Clint showered and then they left for the office. Natasha was waiting for them outside Phil’s office and they went in and sat down around the couch.

Clint spoke first. “I’ve been thinking.”

“You were supposed to be sleeping,” Natasha said.

“Yeah. Yeah, I did. I slept good, really.” He winked at Phil and Natasha rolled her eyes. “But really. You shouldn’t go undercover, Nat. You really shouldn’t.”

“Why not?” Natasha asked, folding her arms across her chest.

“It’s just that it’s not only undercover, but if he finds out you know me he’ll kill you.”

“How’s he going to find out, Clint?” Phil said.

“He could. And . . . dammit. I don’t have a good reason, okay? But he could. He could.” He leaned forward and put his head in his hands.

“It’s not your decision, Clint, and it’s a good plan.”

“Not as good as it can be,” Phil said, quietly.

They both turned to him. “How?” Clint asked.

“Listen. Natasha infiltrates. Lets it drop that she has a contact. Someone not to be messed with. Someone who could supply Barney’s ring with guns at a good price. She’s knows his stuff is good because she’s worked with him and he’s good. Happens to be hell with a bow and arrow, too, she says casually.”

Clint stood and began pacing Phil’s office.

“She sets up a drop and a meeting and Barney will come because his interest will be piqued by the stories she tells of the guy with the bow. He’ll want to meet you, like you said. We can move in on him at the drop and it’s done.” 

Clint stood stock still and Natasha was quiet for a moment.

“It’s a good idea, Phil,” she said. She stood and moved to Clint. She leaned into him from behind and wrapped her arms loosely around his waist. “I’ll be fine, Clint. I’ve done worse than infiltrate a gun ring before. You know that.”

He nodded and Phil watched as he turned and took her face in his hands. He could feel the conflict emanating from Clint and knew his fears for Natasha at the hands of his brother. But Natasha was one of the three toughest people Phil had ever met. She was right. She could handle this.

“You’re my family, now,” he said, simply. She nodded.

“I’ll make sure I run point with her,” Phil said, standing. “You can run third like Fury said, but help with the point calls while she’s in alone. You know him, after all.”

Clint sighed. “Okay. Come on SHIELD Suit,” he said to Phil, stepping away from Natasha. “Let’s go run this past the FBI Suits.” Phil smacked the back of his head as they went through the door.

As it turned out, the FBI agents had come up with a startlingly similar plan. They’d even found an insertion point for Natasha – a Russian weapons ring that had gone defunct that she could claim to come from. They already had the research on Barney’s operation; they just hadn’t known who he was, so they had plenty of information. Phil listened carefully; taking meticulous notes, as did Natasha, but Clint just listened.

It would be a three-week operation. The FBI would get Natasha inserted into the organization and she’d run data collection for a couple of weeks. If she managed good intel then they’d not only get their rogue agent, but they’d shut down a pretty significant weapons ring. After a couple of weeks she’d get cocky with them. Want to please the boss. Offer the hint about the mysterious weapons guy she knew.  Hopefully Barney would take the bait and want a meeting. She’d set it up and then they’d move.

When they dismissed for the afternoon Clint had been given one order from the suits: help Natasha learn as much as she could about Barney Barton so that she’d be prepared.

That pissed Clint off.

He stormed out of the room and ignored Phil and Natasha completely, slamming his way through the stairwell doors and running down the steps until he got to the right floor. He let himself onto the archery range and used a manual override he’d stolen to lock the door completely. Even Phil’s clearance card wouldn’t get him in this time. He stripped off the sweatshirt he was wearing and clasped on his shooting glove and began to shoot.

Arrow after arrow, naming each one. His father, his mother, his first foster family names, his few acquaintances he’d made during all the shifts from foster home to foster home after the crash, the third foster family, the one that did the most damage, the people he and Barney met on the circus – he dredged up every name he could remember – the circus words, the places they visited, everything got an arrow. He heard the pounding on the door to the range but he ignored it, loosing arrow after arrow.

Finally, when he reached the end of his litany, he got himself a bottle of water and calmly went and opened the door, letting Phil and Natasha storm in as he sat on the bench with his water and looked up at them, expecting a fight. They just watched him carefully.

“What?” he finally asked, tired of the game.

“What the hell, Clint?” Natasha said. “We wanted to talk to you.”

He shrugged and took another drink. “Okay. So talk now. Now I’m ready.”

He saw Phil drag a hand across his face and sit down.

“Why are you so angry?” Natasha said. “Their plan matched ours.”

“Yeah,” Clint said, “It did. Except the part where I help you get to know my long-lost brother. Because that’s bullshit.”

“Why?” Natasha said. “You might be able to help.”

Clint laughed and stood up, pacing, Phil’s eyes never leaving his face.

“Help?” he asked. “Will it help if you know he was a bully to other kids but took as many beatings as he could for me before our parents died? Will it help if you know he taught me how to steal from our foster families and made me give everything to him? Would it help you to understand him better if you knew that on the circus he beat me up every time I made a mistake and then when I found archery and was bringing in money for us and NOT doing anything wrong he beat me up because he was jealous of the attention? And that was when he _knew_ that Trickshot and Duquesne were both beating the shit out of me every time I missed my mark by anything? Will it help to know that he left me for dead when he left the circus and he watched as Trickshot ordered me . . .” at this his breath and energy ran out and he was about to spill Barney’s greatest crime and he didn’t want to do that and he’d already said too much and Phil and Natasha were both staring at him with worry and a tinge of fear and _fuck_ , he didn’t know what to do or where to run.

So he dropped back down to the bench and dropped the water bottle on the floor, tucking his arms against his chest and looking down.

Natasha knelt down in front of him, putting her hands on his knees. He could feel her staring at him and waiting, and finally he looked up at her and met her eyes.

“You don’t have to tell me anything more, okay?” she said. “I’ll be fine without it. I’ve done missions with less recon before. I’ll make do without it here.”

He shook his head and covered her hands with his; god he loved her hands, so gorgeous and deadly. He knew those hands would kill anyone who messed with him or Coulson and he _loved_ that. “ Nat,” he said. “I can’t help you know him because I don’t know him. I never really did.”

“It doesn’t look like there was much of anyone to know,” Phil said, quietly. He was sitting next to Clint with his hands folded across his chest, and Clint knew that posture. It meant he was trying not to touch Clint, trying not to interfere, to intrude on his space, both physical and psychological.

Clint kind of wanted him to intrude, now, so he leaned into his shoulder. “It’s been twenty years and I wasn’t in _any_ state of mind to be paying any kind of attention to who my brother was becoming.” He looked down at Natasha. “He’s smart, Nat. He pulled a lot of smart stunts when we were kids and he’s pulling this one now. Just don’t underestimate him.”

It was two days of studying, conversations with FBI agents who knew Barney, reading files, and Clint doing his damndest to remember anything about Barney’s personality and quirks, usually not coming up with much. But he helped Natasha study – quizzed her on the weapons ring information, quizzed her on what she was supposed to know about the Russian organization, quizzed her on Barney. Phil ran between strategy meetings and other SHIELD operations, and on the third day they got word from the FBI that things had been set into motion.

Natasha’s insertion story had been planted, and they were waiting for word from their contacts on when and where she should be, so she had to be ready. The word came two days later with a contact point and time, and she reported to SHIELD medical for the comm implant, wrapped Clint and Phil in long embraces, promising to be careful and trust their orders, and everyone set off for the destination point.

Clint was as much of a nervous wreck as his professionalism would allow. He and Phil took up their position in the rented apartment less than a block from where Natasha would be, and began the listening post. Phil knew that Clint was a wreck, but that only he could see it. A slight tremor in the hands, a short temper, and some nervous pacing where he could usually sit still in a corner and listen without moving.

They listened as Natasha introduced herself to Barney’s lackeys in her usually-hidden thick Russian accent.

Clint mouthed to Phil, _Her accent is so fucking sexy_ , and Phil just rolled his eyes. They heard her explain how she was out of work but good at running meetings, good at seeing things others might not, good at getting out of tight spots. They listened as the lackey demanded a demonstration and she obviously impressed him with her acrobatics and weapons handling.

And then they listened as she was escorted in to meet with Barney. Phil watched Clint’s body tense when the lackey said, “Yeah, the boss wants to meet you,” after Natasha had been left in a room for several hours. They heard her walking down the hall, an office door opening, and a smooth voice asking her to sit down.

Phil figured he could have knocked Clint over with a breath at that moment.

“You want to work for me?” Barney said.

Clint stiffened as he heard his brother’s voice.

“Yes. I have things to offer.”

“We have deal makers.”

“You don’t have me. I have people to introduce you to. International people as well as well as some others.”

“Why work for me?” Barney said.

“You’re good and I’m out of work.”

There was a pause and Phil heard papers shuffling. He watched Clint put his hands against a wall of the apartment and bow his head down.

“Trial run. Get me one of those introductions you mentioned and I’ll consider it.”

“Done,” Natasha said, and they could hear her stand and leave the room. They listened as she was given contact methods and then escorted out of the building. She wouldn’t talk to Clint and Phil, not until the whole thing was over, but they could always talk unheard to her.

“Nice work, Romanov,” Phil said. He saw Clint nod, turn his back to the wall, and sink to the floor. “Yell if you need something – we’ll be on.” They would monitor her closely, but Phil could shut off his input to her if he needed to, and he needed to now.

He went and sat next to Clint on the floor. “You okay?”

Clint nodded, looking away. “Weird hearing him over the comms.”

“Yeah, I don’t doubt it. Weird for me, too. You guys sound alike.”

Clint looked up at him sharply. “Yeah?”

Phil nodded and stood back up, reaching down for Clint’s hand and pulling him up and over to the couch. They sat, both lost in their own thoughts and Phil listening for all the signs of an op at risk from Natasha’s end. It was true; Clint’s brother sounded an awful lot like Clint. He was less oily sounding than Phil expected. He couldn’t hear much in Barney’s voice beyond business, and it reminded Phil of when he first met Clint, who had been so defensive, so closed, so empty.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The confrontation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Quick update because of weekend travels. I hope you all enjoy! Thanks again to dysprositos, beta-extraordinaire.

Business was done. Natasha arranged the first meeting and it went well. She was accepted into Barney’s operation and began collecting information. She was good. Phil was amazed at how many people she charmed and talked to and got to give little snippets of intel. She worked for a week and Agent Smith of the FBI was joking about how they really wanted her to switch teams when this was over. 

Phil and Clint hardly slept. They listened in shifts to Natasha and talked to her at night when she was alone, Clint doing something Phil had never seen before. He pulled a book out of his bag and began reading out loud the second night. Phil looked at him questioningly and he just shrugged. She likes it, he mouthed, and went on reading until Natasha fell asleep. The two men slept in shifts, still, so they could hear if anything befell Natasha during the night.

It didn’t. Things went well. Two and a half weeks in Natasha was called back to Barney’s office. 

“I want to thank you,” Barney said. “You’ve managed two lucrative leads for us as well as fending off some unwanted customers. I appreciate it.” 

“You paid me,” she said. “That’s what I’m hired for.” 

“Yes, and I was hoping we could get to know each other a little more. Would you come to dinner with me tonight? Off duty. Just dinner.” 

Phil saw Clint break the pen he was holding in half.

“All right,” she said, turning the charm in her voice up a notch. 

“I’ll meet you at The Claremont at seven?” Barney said.

“Yes,” she replied, and the meeting was over. 

Clint spent the next few hours pacing, and Phil couldn’t get him to sit down. He researched the restaurant Natasha was heading to and they headed to the closest monitoring point. 

The sounds of the restaurant filled their headphones and they listened as Natasha was escorted to Barney’s table. She sat down and they made small talk while they ordered food and drinks. Barney complimented her and began asking where she was from.

She told him her cover story about the Russian weapons ring and about her childhood in Russia in her smooth and sultry voice, and finally managed to ask him about his own childhood long after their food had arrived. Clint began pacing again.

“It was all over the place,” Barney said first. 

“Why?” she replied. 

He laughed, a mirthless laugh, and Clint stopped his trek around the room.

“A few boring reasons,” Barney said.

“I’m not easily bored,” Natasha said.

“Ah, no one is bored by the circus.” 

“What?”

“I spent the best part of my childhood traveling with the circus. No parents involved.” 

“Really!” She said. “That’s romantic.” 

“Not much,” Barney said, and Phil saw Clint nod slightly. 

“Well, it’s interesting anyway,” Natasha said. “Very interesting, actually.” 

“Why very interesting,” Barney asked, his voice taking a harder edge.

This was it. Phil tensed.

“Well, I know of another weapons expert who is rumored to have grown up on the circus. I just find it interesting that you would have the same background. Can you shoot an arrow and hit anything, too?” 

They heard Barney set his glass down hard on the table, rattling the silverware. 

“What are you talking about?” he said, quietly.

“Oh, I’m sure it’s nothing. I was just working with an operation just after I got to the States, on a temporary job, and their leader was an incredible archer. I’ve never seen anything like it. He could pierce a handful of balls that someone threw, missing none of them. He knew what he was doing in the operation, too. He just didn’t have a spot for me.” 

“Did you meet him?” Barney asked. 

Phil could hear the eagerness in his voice.

“Yes. Once,” Natasha said.

“What was his name? Did he give you his name?” 

“Not his real name. He had a cover name.” 

“What was it?” 

“Hawkeye.”   
There was a long pause. 

“Tell me about this operation,” Barney said.

An hour later and dinner was over. Natasha had a command from Barney to contact Hawkeye’s operation and set up a meeting. The next morning she reported back to Barney with a place and a time. He changed it and made it that night. Natasha rolled with it and accepted the change, saying she’d get in touch with Hawkeye and confirm it.

Two hours later Clint was dressing for a meeting with his brother. He thought of when he got his first circus costume for his act with the Swordsman. It was purple and silver and Barney laughed at him. He just jutted his chin out and ignored him, and then threw him a handful of money when he got his first pay from performing. “Laugh at that,” he said, and Barney just glowered. Now he was pulling on worn jeans and a white t-shirt, and Phil wasn’t laughing.

The meeting place was a bar in a run-down neighborhood. Phil seemed angry about the whole thing as Clint dressed, and Clint couldn’t figure out why.

“Because we had a whole team of backup ready for our spot. They don’t have time to scope out the new place,” Phil said when Clint asked what why he was mad.

“Phil, they’re pros. They’ll do fine at the new place. Besides, we won’t need them.”

“You know this? He’s making Natasha go to the meeting, you both will be without weapons –“ 

Clint interrupted him with a laugh. “Really? Without weapons?” 

“Without . . . okay, you guys are weapons, but still.” He paused. “This whole thing is wrong. It just feels wrong, Clint.” 

Clint knew what he meant. They’d been listening in on Barney’s operation for over two weeks. The way this went down, it seemed. . . too easy. He shrugged. “There’s nothing we can do about it except be on our toes, Phil.” 

“We’re missing something,” Phil said.

Clint just put on the leather jacket over his white t-shirt and tucked his shirt into his jeans. 

Phil smiled at him. “James Dean.” 

Clint laughed. “You wish, Phil.” He leaned in and gave Phil a quick kiss and they left for the meeting.

The bar was in a faded yellow building with brown wooden doors and had two ways in – a front entrance and a rear entrance into an alleyway. Phil would be stationed out front a block or so down and Clint would arrive with an escort, an undercover FBI agent who would get deposited at the door. Clint and the agent approached the bar at the assigned time and the agent was pushed back while Clint was frisked. They let Clint enter and he stepped through the doorway.

There was a wooden bar to his left and a series of wooden tables lining the right wall. The place was empty of regular patrons. He saw Natasha and Barney sitting at the back corner table. She was in a casual yellow dress and Barney was in a suit. He had aged, and Clint marveled at the lines in his face and the grey in his hair. He stood, though, as Clint approached, and was obviously in good physical shape. A grin spread across his face that almost made Clint stumble as he flashed back to the good days on the circus. 

“Hey, little brother,” Barney said, standing and offering his hand to Clint. 

Clint found himself staring at Barney’s hand for a moment, remembering all of the pain and all of the protection it had given him as a kid. He shook himself mentally, though, and he steeled his face into a smile and shook Barney’s hand. “Small world, Barney.” 

“It is, it is. Sit down,” he said, gesturing for Clint to take up the chair across from Natasha. 

He reached his hand out to her. “Ms. Vitaly, it’s good to see you again. Thanks for setting this up.” 

She nodded and smiled, shaking his hand. “It seemed good business.” 

Barney laughed and sat down, “Business and pleasure. A reunion at long last, right Clint?” 

He nodded. “I’m really just interested in making a deal. It’s a bit late for a reunion.” His voice sounded brittle to his own ears.

Barney smiled at him. “Yes, I suppose it is. The last time I saw you in person you weren’t in a position to hand out hugs, so I guess we’re too far gone for that sort of thing.” 

Clint tried to hide the flash of anger in his eyes, but he wasn’t sure he managed. He tried not to let his mind go back to the last time he saw Barney, either. He couldn’t let himself go there. He felt his palms sweat and he swallowed. He was having trouble concentrating and really needed to   
pull his shit together if this was going to work. He had to get Natasha out of there and try and get Barney to the FBI agents without any bloodshed. If he got lost in bad memories, that wouldn’t happen. “So, Business,” he said.

They talked weapons for a few minutes and agreed on a deal. Clint played the skeptic. “How do I know I’m not going to get gunned down the second I walk out that door?” 

Barney seemed surprised. “I wasn’t going to kill you before I knew who you were for sure, why would I kill you now?” 

Suddenly a voice came from the back of the bar, a voice that haunted Clint in his nightmares and one that made even Barney turn a little pale as they looked over. It said, “Because he’s a deceptive little shit the same now as he ever was, Barton. You shouldn’t trust him.” 

Clint turned and there was Buck Chisolm, exiting the back room and wandering over to their table. “Trick Shot,” he said, a bit breathlessly. He felt himself pale, his breath quickened, and he felt a cold sweat break out. He couldn’t face Chisolm. This wasn’t part of the deal. He looked at Barney and realized that this was a surprise to him as well. 

Buck leered at them. “Lucky position I got myself in,” he said,” Two Bartons with one stone.” And he pulled out a gun and aimed it at Barney. 

They all tensed and Natasha stood up, playing the innocent caught in the crossfire. “I’m getting out of here,” she said, acting nervous. “You boys can fight this out on your own.” 

From the kitchen in the back, a tall, burly man stepped out and aimed another gun at them, this time at Natasha. Buck Chisolm laughed. “Don’t think so, sweetheart. I doubt you’re a weapons dealer any more than the little Hawk here, after all. Sit down.” 

“What are you talking about, Chisolm?” Barney said, darkly.

“You seriously think they’re in weapons? How convenient that you two meet each other again now, Barton, a month after you go AWOL from the FBI. He’s been missing for twenty years and now ‘poof’ he’s back? Think about it.”   
Barney looked at Clint. “Well?” 

“I don’t know what he’s talking about, Barney. I’m here to make a deal. You want in, Trick Shot?” he asked, hoping his voice was steadier than it felt. He had to steel every nerve in his body to keep himself in his chair.

Chisolm came around from the bar to sit down. He was a tall man, thin, and had thinning blonde hair at his shoulders. He was wearing black jeans and a purple button down shirt and had a grin on his face. He sat down and held up a small box. 

“I am here to make a deal, little Hawk,” he said. “Barney and I are going to bargain over which one of us gets to kill which of you two little narcs and then I get his territory wholesale for not turning him over to the feds. If things get out of hand, I made it so I can blow this place to hell and leave no trace. Got it?”

Clint tilted his head to get a better look at the box Chisolm was holding. That was when he heard Phil in his ear. 

“Natasha, you are to take out Barney Barton and get him out of the building into FBI hands, on my mark. Clint, you are to take out Chisolm by any means necessary, on my mark. Federal agents will handle the goons on my mark. We go at once and the box won’t mean a thing. Thirty seconds from now.” His voice was calm. It was a job.

Clint started a silent count in his head. He looked at Chisolm. “You don’t get to kill me this time, Trick Shot,” he said, feeling the rage he had toward the man in front of him slip out a bit. He could do this. He had to. He was more experienced now. Phil had taught him how to do this. Control. Just like Phil taught him. He took even breaths as the silent count continued.

“You sure about that, Clint?” Chisolm spit his name out like it was old tobacco. “How do you think you’re going to manage to escape?” 

Suddenly, in Clint’s ear was Phil’s calm voice. “Go. Now.” And gunfire erupted from the entrance to the bar, taking out the gunman standing in the kitchen and the two lackeys Barney had brought along. Clint felt Natasha move at the same time he did, and he leapt across the table, knocking the box out of Chisolm’s hands. 

Chisolm was taken off-guard, but he recovered quickly. Clint threw a kick at him, knowing that if he could get hold of a weapon he’d make quicker work of this. He heard Natasha and Barney scuffling off to the side – she had disarmed him in her first move – and he thought he heard a bone snap. Chisolm went down with Clint’s kick, and he pressed his momentum and managed to get a choke hold on the larger man. Chisolm used his own greater weight, though, and managed to shove Clint’s arms away and shove him toward the floor. Clint threw his feet out and tangled them in Chisolm’s legs, and pulled him down. 

He rolled Chisolm over, and heard Natasha dragging Barney out of the room saying, “Barton, we’re out!” 

He saw Chisolm draw a knife and he grappled for it, realizing that he, finally, was stronger than his former mentor. He twisted the knife out of Chisolm’s hands and thrust it into his abdomen, hard. 

Chisolm was surprised. His arms fell slack to the floor and then he tried to struggle, but the knife would was too deep and Clint leaned back, away and saw blood pooling on the floor and lining Chisolm’s mouth. He closed his eyes for a second as memories overwhelmed him – of the day Clint lay in his own pooling blood with Chisolm standing over him. He shook his head clear, though, and looked down at the man lying at his feet.

“I’ll let the feds deal with you, too, old man, if you survive,” Clint said, and stepped back. 

Chisolm smiled up at him as blood lined his lips, and Clint heard an FBI agent enter the room to offer Clint backup. “You forgot one thing, little Hawk,” Chisolm said.

And Clint realized that he had managed to get the box back into his hands and was pressing the charge on top. “Shit!” He yelled. “Get out! Get out!” He called to the agent at the door. The man turned and tried to bolt. Clint was nowhere near the door and did the only thing he could think of at the last second. 

He dove behind the big, wooden bar, hoping it would offer some protection, and then the world exploded. 

When Phil saw Natasha stumble out into the alley with Barney Barton in tow, he ordered the two FBI agents to take over Barton and watched as they cuffed him. He was dazed from a head wound Natasha had given him and his right arm was obviously broken. Phil felt his breath hitch when he saw Barton in the flesh – he was simply an older and taller version of Clint.

Natasha and the agents crossed the street to the lookout point and she said, breathlessly, “I think Clint’s got Trick Shot. I know he can take him, anyway.” Phil nodded and looked back to the bar, where another agent had entered the front door to give Clint some backup. It should be over soon. 

Suddenly he saw the agent dart out the front door, throwing his arms up to cover his head and then the bar exploded. Phil felt like he’d been sucker punched. The blood drained from his face as he watched the building, an old building, crackle and burn. 

An agent was on the phone next to him, calling the fire department and Natasha was moving across the street. Phil followed and started into the building when Natasha grabbed him. 

“Wait,” she said, “It’s too dangerous. It’s an old building and could go.” 

“Clint’s still in there!” Phil said, pulling his arm away. 

She caught him again, harder this time. “I know. And he’d kill me if I let anything happen to you. The fire crew will get him out.” 

He stopped, and he counted to sixty, trying to focus and not think about Clint burning to death. The fire crew was there quickly, stationed nearby. They entered the building after Phil told them there were at least two people trapped. He counted in his head some more.

Thirty seconds later, one of the firemen emerged, carrying Clint. 

He was unconscious and had blood streaming down his face and was deathly pale. Phil knelt down next to him as the fireman went for a shock blanket to cover him with until the ambulance could get there. Phil looked him over and saw that his leg was the real problem. There was a large piece of wood from the bar impaled in his thigh, and blood was pouring from the wound. Phil quickly tore his own tie from around his neck and tied off Clint’s leg to try and staunch the flow of blood.

Natasha leaned over and put her hand on Clint’s forehead and Phil grasped his limp hand. 

“Clint,” he said. “Clint, wake up, come on, please.” This wasn’t right. It wasn’t even a SHIELD operation and Phil was damned if he was going to let the past that Clint fought so hard to overcome defeat him. “Clint, wake up.” 

He looked up and saw the firemen carrying the body of Buck Chisolm out of the building, and he watched as a blanket was used to cover the man up. Dead, then, Phil thought. Good.

Clint’s eyes fluttered open as Phil heard the sounds of the ambulance drawing closer. He started coughing, and Phil held him firmly so he didn’t jar his leg. When he stopped and drew ragged breaths instead, Natasha leaned over and spoke softly to him, trying to calm him down. 

His eyes were wild with fear. Phil pulled Clint’s hand into his own and held it tight, feeling Clint grip it like a vice. “Phil, I can’t -“ He coughed some more. “Oh god, my leg,” he managed. 

“I know, it hurts,” Phil said calmly. “The ambulance is almost here. Hang on.” 

When Phil spoke, he noticed Clint watching his face intently and fear was filling his eyes again. 

“Phil,” he said, and Phil had never heard such desperation in his archer’s voice, “Phil, I can’t-“ 

And Phil realized something. Clint wasn’t paying any attention to Natasha, who was talking calmly to him the whole time. It was as if he didn’t even realize she was there. But Clint was overcome with another coughing fit, and this time it didn’t stop. The smoke in his lungs was desperate to get out and Phil couldn’t hold him still. 

The medics approached just as Clint passed out again, and they pushed Phil and Natasha away. 

An hour later, Phil and Natasha were finally able to get to the hospital after coordinating with the FBI for Barney’s removal to custody and leaving their agents in charge of the cleanup at the bar. Phil found himself pacing the hospital waiting room nervously while Natasha sat silent and still in a nearby chair. 

Finally, the doctor emerged to talk to them. Phil crossed his arms over his chest and held himself rigid. He didn’t like the look on the doctor’s face one bit. 

“Agent Barton survived the surgery,” the man said, quietly. Phil exhaled as the doctor continued. “He’s lost a lot of blood, suffered from smoke inhalation, and has a concussion. The leg wound was severe, and there was quite a lot of muscle and tissue damage. He’s going to need physical therapy. The smoke inhalation was also severe, and we’ve got him on concentrated oxygen right now and that’s going to stay for a while. We’ll keep an eye on the concussion, and we did a CT scan on it and are waiting on those results.” 

“He’s going to be alright, though?” Natasha asked, quietly. 

The doctor nodded. “The question will be his physical ability with his leg. He’s got a lot of work ahead of him. We’re also concerned about the results of the CT scan and the concussion.”   
“Why?” Phil asked.

“He regained consciousness before the surgery, briefly. He was severely disoriented and completely non-responsive to our questions. The CT scan will show us the severity of the concussion and whether there might be another cause for the disorientation.”

Phil didn’t like the sound of that one bit. “What else could cause it?” 

The doctor looked at him thoughtfully for a moment and then replied, “It was as if he couldn’t hear us.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clint tries do deal with the physical fallout of the take-down of his brother and the emotional fallout of the death of Trick Shot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to dysprositos for her beta magik.

 

Suddenly it clicked into place why Clint hadn’t acknowledged Natasha at the explosion site.

 

“Can we see him?” Phil asked, quietly.

 

They were led to the room by the doctor, and before he told them they could stay as long as they liked, he stopped them and told them about what to expect.

 

Phil and Natasha nodded, and entered the room. Phil had already made the call to get Clint moved to the SHIELD medical facility, but they didn’t want to move him until he’d been stable a little longer. Phil and Natasha took up separate sides of Clint’s bed, and Phil sucked in a breath when he saw Clint’s face.

 

He was pale and his cheeks seemed sunken in, and his breathing was labored despite the oxygen. The cut on the side of his head was stitched and bandaged, and his bad leg was wrapped tightly and slightly elevated. Phil pulled a chair over and sat down. He texted Fury and told him not to expect Phil at the office anytime soon, and then picked up Clint’s hand and waited.

 

Clint only knew he was waking up because the roaring sound in his ears seemed to get louder and the screwdriver boring into his leg hurt more. He could also feel the IV in his arm. Roaring in his ears and pain - that's what he knew, and only that, so he opened his eyes.

 

Phil was sitting in a chair nearby, working on his computer and talking on his earpiece. Talking. Typing. Silently. There was only a roaring in Clint's ears. He took a deep breath and saw Phil start. He saw him say something and then close his laptop, shoving it aside. Roaring in his ears and pain in his leg.

 

Clint watched Phil move to his bedside and lean over. Clint closed his eyes and felt Phil's lips on his, gentle and slow, and then he pulled back with a smile and brushed his hand along Clint's cheek. It felt good. Calm.

 

Not like the roaring in his ears and the pain in his leg. Phil leaned back and said something and Clint tried to stay calm but he couldn't hear Phil, couldn't hear anything and suddenly the memory of the explosion in the bar returned with a sudden jolt. He blinked rapidly and tried to talk, but he couldn't hear his own voice and he wasn't sure he was saying anything at all.

 

"Phil, I can't hear anything. What the hell, Phil?" he _felt_ panicked, didn't know if he _sounded_ that way because he _couldn't fucking hear_.

 

Phil leaned over the nearby table and pulled a stack of 5x7 note cards into his hands and held one up. It read, "You're going to be okay. You may have lost some hearing in the explosion."

 

Some. "I can't hear anything, Phil!" He was having trouble breathing. Every breath hurt and he wanted to trust Phil, who was definitely not freaking out right now, but dammit, he was surrounded by pain and roaring and had definitely lost more than _some_ hearing.

 

Phil held up another card. "Noise-induced hearing loss isn't always permanent." he paused to pull out another card. "Plus, you don't have to listen to Fury for a while. That has to be good." Phil offered a small smile and leaned back over Clint’s bed, grasping his hand and squeezing, running his other hand down Clint’s cheek.

 

Clint closed his eyes and took deep breaths, trying to slow himself down and think. He couldn't hear because of the explosion. Phil was here, holding up cards with information and jokes on them. He opened his eyes again and said, "Am I talking funny? I can't hear myself." He figured he might as well let curiosity guide his questions. It was better than panic.

 

Phil nodded, yes.

 

"No card for that one?"

 

Phil shook his head, no.

 

"What's with the cards?"

 

Phil reached down and pulled another card out. It read, "I didn't want you to be scared."

 

Clint closed his eyes and felt Phil squeeze his hand. He opened them after a moment. "Natasha. Is she okay?" Phil nodded. "What about Barney and Buck?" he watched as Phil sifted through his cards and Clint imagined him sitting there while Clint slept, trying to think of the questions Clint would ask so he wouldn't be scared.

 

Phil pulled out a card. "Barney is in custody with a broken arm and Buck Chisolm is dead."

 

Clint felt his chest constrict again and so he looked away from Phil and shut his eyes. He kept them closed because he was afraid that if he opened them Phil would see everything. If he opened them Phil would see what happened and he would walk away.

 

He would walk away because what kind of sick fuck couldn't feel relief when a man like Trick Shot died? What idiot felt remorse, fear, and uncertainty about a world without the sadist who broke him in it? So Clint kept his eyes shut and tried to breathe evenly. He felt Phil take his hand gently and wait, but Clint was overcome with tiredness and slipped back into sleep, where it seemed safer at the moment.

 

Phil watched as Clint absorbed the news about Barney and Chisolm, and as he fell asleep without another word. There was something about Chisolm, Phil thought. Something different for Clint than his feelings about Barney, something darker and more frightening. He’d been picking up hints from Clint through this whole thing and now it seemed confirmed: Buck Chisolm scared Clint. He scared him and threw his emotions into chaos, even with his death. Phil hoped Clint would tell him someday, just so he could let it go.

 

A little later, when Phil was gathering his paperwork into his briefcase after getting a text from SHIELD saying they would have a helicopter over in less than an hour to pick Clint up, Natasha entered the room.

“Hey,” she said. “How’s he doing?”

Phil looked up from his papers. “Sleeping mostly. He woke up once and we talked a little. He can’t hear anything.” He heard how dejected his voice sounded and looked up at Natasha.

“SHIELD will figure something out, right?” she said.

“I’ve already talked to Jack in R&D. He says it’s too soon to do anything concrete right now, but that he’ll be looking into it. The doctor said they’d have to give it some time and run a battery of tests to determine the extent of the damage.” He stepped over to Clint. “I told him about Trick Shot and he didn’t say anything else, just went back to sleep.”

They stood silently keeping vigil for a while, and then the doctor and some nurses came in to prep Clint for transfer. 

It went smoothly. They’d sedated him to keep him from waking during the process, and that afternoon Phil was sitting in the SHIELD medical facility waiting for Clint to wake up again. He looked up at a noise and was surprised to see Fury standing there.

“How is he?” Fury asked, coming into the room.

“He should be waking again soon,” Phil said. “Did they tell you he’s lost his hearing? At least temporarily, possibly permanently.”

Fury nodded and stood at the end of Clint’s bed for a few minutes. Then he gestured Phil to come with him into the hallway. “He can have as much leave time as he needs, obviously. Have you spoken to R&D?”

Phill nodded. “Yes. They’re looking into it.”

“Good. Now, when’s the last time you slept?”

The question caught Phil off guard. “Yesterday . . . no, the day before. It’s been a while,” he said, sheepishly.

Fury nodded. “Okay. I’ll check in with you a little later. You’ll need to meet with the FBI for a debriefing, but I’ll push it to at least tomorrow.”

“Thanks.”

A few minutes after Fury left, a handful of nurses came in and started clearing trays, cabinets, and loose items out of the room. They came back rolling another bed into the room. He raised his eyebrows at Stephen, Clint’s nurse. Stephen grinned. “Director Fury’s orders, sir. Said you should get some sleep.”

Phil nodded and took off his jacket and tie and shoes. He climbed in and watched Clint until he fell into a light sleep.

When he woke a couple hours later, Clint was awake and Natasha was sitting with him. She had a pad of paper and a pen and was writing something down. He sat up and they both looked over at him. She glanced at Phil, scribbled something on the paper and showed it to Clint and he laughed, shaking his head.

“I can get hold of that paper, Romanov,” Phil said, climbing out of the bed and moving to Clint’s side.

“I’ll be eating it when I’m finished, sir. No trace.”

He laughed and leaned over Clint, kissing him on the forehead.

“Before you have to find your cards,” Clint said, “I’m feeling a little better. Leg still hurts like a motherfucker, but my head’s pretty clear. Except for the ocean that seems to have filled my ears. Still can’t hear anything except that.”

Phil nodded. Clint’s voice was soft and uneven, and lacked the buoyancy it usually held. It wasn’t monotone, but Phil could tell that Clint couldn’t hear himself talk.

Natasha spoke. “The doctor came in while you were sleeping, Phil.” She kept her face turned toward Clint so he could see her talking, even though he couldn’t understand. “He said they’re going to do the next surgery soon, so they can get him started on PT as soon as possible. They’re also coming by later today to do some hearing tests.”

Phil reached for her pad of paper and wrote, showing it to Clint, “Good. Fury assured me you have all the time you need to recover.”

“Fury’s being nice,” Clint said, smiling. “Doesn’t suit him.”

“Well, I don’t want to be around when he reams the FBI for not seeing Trick Shot coming.” Phil wrote.

A shadow crossed Clint’s eyes at the mention of Trick Shot, but he asked, “Any news on Barney?”

They sat and talked for a while about what might befall Clint’s brother now that he was caught, and then the doctor came in to run the hearing tests. Phil stayed and Natasha promised to be back later. When they were finished with the testing, Clint was exhausted.

“Phil,” he said, after the doctors left. Phil could hear desperation in his voice. “Phil, there can’t be a deaf field agent. I’m done here if it’s permanent.”

Phil picked up his note cards from earlier. He’d been expecting this conversation. He found the one he was looking for  and held it up. “You’re not an average field agent. SHEILD will do whatever it takes to get you back in the field.”

Clint shook his head hard. “Too much liability. Even with aids. They get messed up, or damaged, and I’m screwed.”

Phil shook his head and used the pen to underline ‘do whatever it takes,’ on the card.

Clint smiled. “Stubborn.”

Phil just nodded, and they sat holding hands until Clint fell asleep again. Phil decided to take advantage of the situation and slept as well.

When Clint woke next, he was alone. Phil's bed was empty and Natasha wasn't around. He tried not to panic. They were close by, unless something major had happened, and they'd be back soon. He tried to relax and assess himself.

His leg still hurt, and it probably would for quite some time. His head hurt again, probably another consistency for a while. He was hungry, and that was probably a good thing. He still had a roaring in his ears, but he wondered if he was imagining it quieting down. He still couldn't make any other sounds out, though.

Holy shit, he was deaf. Permanent or not, it was the strangest feeling ever. If he looked around too quickly he got dizzy, the roaring was really all there was, and, despite Phil’s reassurances, he figured Fury would have him running a desk job or leave him out on the street before he’d ever let him back in the field.

He decided to try and sit up; the sooner he sat up the sooner he got up, and the sooner he got up the sooner he got out. So he pushed the button to raise the bed and it began to move. The movement changed the position of his head and his leg, though, and pain shot through his thigh and down to his ankle, and the room spun, making him draw a sharp breath through his teeth and making tears spring to his eyes.

He had his head down and was busy trying to get his breathing back to normal when he felt a hand on his back. He looked up sharply and Natasha was a step behind Phil, who began rubbing small circles on Clint's back, and she leaned over. She pulled his chin up so he was looking at her. He couldn't hear her, but he saw the worry on her face as she asked him a question.

"Just wanted to sit up," he said through clenched teeth. Finally, the fire settled into the screwdriver pain he'd felt earlier and the nausea abated, so he looked up, exasperated. "Goddammit, this sucks, guys."

Natasha nodded and smiled softly and Phil gathered the notebook and his cards from the table. Clint saw him shuffle through and pull one out. It read, "You’re going to need another surgery on your leg. Plus PT." Phil pulled out the pen and added, on the notebook, "They want to do the next surgery tomorrow. They want you out of here ASAP."

"Do they have a waiting list or something?" Clint said.

Coulson grinned and wrote some more. "They know you're going to get cranky soon and they don't feel like dealing with an escape attempt."

Clint leaned back and sighed. "They know me. That's good."

Natasha pulled the notebook out of Phil's hands and wrote for a minute. Clint took the chance to glance at Phil, who held his gaze, as if they might be able to hear each other's thoughts. Clint was wishing for a little telepathy as Natasha handed him the notebook.

He read, "One, do you need some more pain meds?" He wanted to say no and just tough it out. He hated what pain meds did to him. But the screwdriver feeling in his leg was strong and he was definitely stuck here another day or two, so he pointed to the question and said, "Yeah, thanks."

He kept reading as Phil left to get the nurse and meds. "Two, Barney is in custody and they're doing a preliminary trial later this afternoon. They want a written statement from you about what happened at the bar. They're expediting his case because of the extensive back charges. You need to write it before the pain meds kick in."

He looked up and grinned at her."It would be a more interesting report after the meds kick in, though."

She agreed, but handed him a piece of SHIELD letterhead and the pen. He sighed and began writing. He kept it basic, no emotion, just a report.  It took him about fifteen minutes, and when he finished and signed it, the nurse was waiting right there to give him the pain meds. He hesitated as he handed the letter to Phil. It felt like he was handing over a death warrant, but he did it anyway and then he swallowed the pills the nurse gave him.

Phil was sitting on the edge of his bed and Natasha was sitting on Phil's bed, and Clint leaned back and gazed at them, tiredly. "They’re going to kill him," he said, feeling his voice shake. They looked at him solemnly and just nodded. "Yeah, that's what I thought." he said with a sigh, and he closed his eyes and felt the medicine kicking in.

He was stumbling down through disjointed memories as he felt himself fading a little. Barney was holding his hand at their parents' funeral, Barney was pulling Clint along in the middle of the night to get away from the foster home where Clint had become the father's favorite target when he was drunk, Barney was wrapping his arm around Clint's shoulder as he introduced them to Mr. Carson and asked for a job. He opened his eyes and looked at his friend and lover and mumbled, "He wasn't always a jerk," and then he faded into sleep as he felt Phil's hand on his forehead.

Phil watched as Clint fell back to sleep and then he looked up, startled at Natasha's hands on his shoulders, gently rubbing. He dropped his head to his chest and let her dig into his shoulders, back and neck for a few minutes, quietly accepting her support. After a bit, she sighed and pulled him over to the other bed and tried to get him to lie down.

"Come on, Phil," she said. "We have a couple hours before we have to leave for the hearing. And Fury said one of us can stay here while the other testifies."

He acquiesced and lay down next to her. "This is going to be hard on Clint," Phil said. She just nodded and said, "Yes." Phil drifted off, his back against Natasha's.

The hearing later that day went as well as it could, Phil thought. Natasha was staying with Clint while Phil went with Fury and turned in Clint’s statement and gave a brief testimony. When he finished, Natasha went while Phil sat with Clint. He held Clint’s hand as he slept, and worried.

“Should he be sleeping this much?” he asked the doctor as he checked Clint’s vitals and his chart. “He’s only been awake once today.”

The doctor looked up. “We’re not worried at this point, sir. His stats look great so far, and there’s really no cause for concern yet.”

Phil nodded his thanks and looked back at Clint. He was just being selfish, and he trusted the doctors at SHIELD implicitly. But he wanted to talk to Clint. He wanted to take him home and have a quiet dinner and go for a walk and play cards with him and hear his infectious laugh fill his apartment.

But now he had to watch him sleep, write him notes, and go testify against his brother, knowing that his brother was going to get the death penalty unless something went very wrong. His worry over sleep was irrational and based on wishful thinking, so he waited.

Natasha returned from giving her deposition and sat down on the bed next to Phil, leaning into his shoulder. "Has he woken?"

“No.”

 

"He's sleeping a lot."

 

Phil nodded and watched Clint sleep for a few minutes. Just as he was moving to get up and go get some coffee, Clint opened his eyes and gave a weak smile. Phil realized he'd really been worrying today, because when Clint looked at him and smiled, he felt relieved. He reached for the notebook and pen.

 

"How are you feeling?" he wrote.

 

Clint closed his eyes and said, "Tired. So tired."

 

Phil wrote, "How's your hearing?"

 

"Shitty. How was the testifying?"

 

"Short, thankfully," Phil wrote, ignoring Clint’s comment about his hearing for now. They’d work on it later.

 

"Did you see Barney?" Clint asked.

 

Phil realized that Clint's voice was getting more monotone. His heart sank a little as he wrote, "Yes."

 

"Is there any news about his trial?" Clint asked.

 

"They're expecting it to last a while," Phil wrote.

 

Clint was quiet for a minute. Then he said, "Surgery tomorrow, they said?"

 

Phil and Natasha both nodded. Natasha took the pen from Phil and wrote, "They'll be in an hour or two to explain. Doctor came by earlier."

 

Clint nodded and at that moment a doctor came into the room. He was carrying a stack of papers and he set them down on the table next to Clint's bed and held one up. It had printed type in a large font and he made sure Clint could see it and he read, "Hi, I'm Doctor Fenton." Clint nodded, and Phil and Natasha said hello. The doctor held up another paper. It read, "I'm here about your hearing tests." Not the doctor they were expecting, but the one they were most interested in.

 

Clint threw a glance at Phil and said, "Okay."

 

Doctor Fenton held up another paper. "The tests show that you've lost 80% of your hearing in your left ear and 70% in your right ear. Both appear from the tests to be permanent, judging from the extent of the damage, but it may improve a bit over time."

 

Phil watched Clint very carefully as he read the note from Fenton and saw him blanch a little. Clint swallowed and closed his eyes, and Phil could swear that the word 'permanent' was swirling around the room in a very palpable way.

 

The doctor nudged Clint's arm and when he opened his eyes the doctor held up a small box and another note. "These are hearing aids. I've already got R&D working on a pair based on your test results that will, quite possibly, be field standard."

 

"Field standard?" Phil asked.

 

"We were informed by Director Fury that if we can get him fitted for something that meets his own designed requirements, then Agent Barton can wear them in the field and keep his Agent status."

 

Phil wanted to find Fury and kiss him. The doctor hurriedly wrote down what Field Standard meant for Clint and Phil saw a genuine smile work its way to Clint's face.

 


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The aftermath. . .

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to dysprositos, my beta guru, and to everyone still reading and reviewing. I appreciate it!

 

Fury would let him back in the field, Clint thought to himself. Fury would let him back in. He grinned at Phil after he read the note and he saw his own relief reflected in Phil’s eyes.

The doctor held up another note, explaining that the aids would be tested only for a few minutes tonight, and they couldn’t be worn while he was sleeping and they might not be the right fit for him right now, that hearing aids were things that required adjustments and tweaking. Clint nodded, and the doctor leaned in, positioning the aids.

It felt funny to Clint, and if he thought about it too hard it was just absurd to him that he was being fitted for hearing aids; he had only turned thirty-eight a few months ago. But he held his breath while the doctor fiddled with them, and then the doctor leaned back and showed Clint how to turn them on. He did it, and was startled at the sound of monitors beeping and Phil’s voice. They weren’t terribly comfortable, but he was hearing noises in the room. That was good.

“What do you think, Clint?” he said.

Clint turned his head from side to side and said, “I think I’d rather hear Fury yell at me than not.”

They spoke for a while and Clint managed to eat some food and get cleaned up a bit, and Natasha said goodnight, promising to be back in the morning before Clint headed into surgery.

Phil looked at him with a small grin after Natasha left. “You’re feeling better,” he said.

Clint nodded and fiddled with the aids. “I can hear. There’s a plan for the leg. Fury isn’t ruling me out. Things are better than they were a couple hours ago.” It was so true.

He felt like he might be able to face the things that weren’t fixable at this point. Barney was going to die. Barney probably deserved to die. God, how could he even add the probably in after seeing everything his brother had done? But he still didn’t know what to make of his feelings about Barney right now, or of Trick Shot’s death.

“What was that look about?” Phil asked, after a moment.

“Just assessing,” Clint said. “Weighing everything out in my head, I guess.”

Phil nodded. “Any balance?”

Clint smiled. “Almost.”

“The hearing thing is strange, huh?” Phil asked, settling into a chair near Clint’s bed.

“Yeah. Very. Never saw that coming. Don’t like it.”

“I know. How are the hearing aids?”

“They’re uncomfortable, but I can hear you and you sound normal. So good,” Clint said with a smile.

Phil leaned over and kissed Clint, long and slow. It felt so damned good to Clint that he figured he could face anything at this point. When Phil pulled back, Clint grinned. “We’re at headquarters.”

Phil nodded. “Yeah. Tonight I don’t care.” He rubbed a hand across his face and Clint knew that he was exhausted, too. He’d stuck by him the whole time and Fury had even had a bed sent in, and Clint was well versed in how tiring sitting and watching someone in pain could be.

“We should sleep,” Clint said.

“Probably.”

Clint pulled Phil back in for another kiss, and then shoved him toward the bed.

Phil laughed and said, “Okay. Okay. Sleep.”

Clint watched as Phil lay down on the bed, and he watched as Phil drifted off to sleep, enjoying the feeling in his chest that rose as he watched. He fell asleep shortly after, only waking a couple of times in the night as the nurses checked on him.

The next morning, Natasha came by to see him before surgery and sat with him while Phil actually went home long enough to shower and get a meal at his own table. Clint insisted.

He and Nat sat in comfortable silence for a while, and then talked a bit about SHIELD business. Phil came back and the staff came in to prep Clint for surgery. He waited patiently while they changed his IV bags, explained what they were going to do – muscle repair sounded just gross to him, but whatever.

They left him with Phil and Natasha for a moment before giving him the first level of anesthesia.

“See you on the other side,” he said lightly to both of them. Natasha smiled and leaned over and kissed him on the forehead before giving a small wave and leaving the room. Phil brushed Clint’s hair out of his eyes and kissed him, long and slow, and then he just winked and left the room. Clint knew he’d be waiting.

As Phil worked on back paperwork for a couple of hours while Clint was in surgery, he tried to anticipate what to expect over the next few days. He made a list of things he had to get done for SHIELD – this FBI case had derailed almost a month for him, something he was very surprised that Fury let slide. He needed to get back on top of things around here.

His list was pretty long, and when he added ‘support Clint in recovery’ to the list, he knew he’d be busy. Clint was a pain in the ass when he was bored, and recovery tended to bore him, even when he wasn’t stuck in medical to do it, so part of Phil’s job in the next few days would be to take Clint’s mind of the pain and boredom – to entertain him.

After a while, Natasha stopped by his office and told him Clint was finished and that they expected him to be back in his room in about forty minutes. He thanked her and wrapped up what he was doing.

He was right about Clint being bored. He couldn’t use crutches right away because of the location of the injury; he couldn’t hold up his bad leg at all, so anything but a wheelchair was out. After a day of recovery in medical he was bitching at the nurses, bitching at Phil, and trying very hard not to bitch at Natasha. Phil tried to run interference as much as possible, but Fury did have him back in meetings and he wasn’t around as much that day as he wanted to be. Finally, the second day, they let him take Clint home.

He took him back to his own place, gave him the remote for the TV and his bow case and cleaning supplies for it, and left him alone to clean his bow so he could go get some groceries.

When he got back home Clint was asleep with his bow across his chest. Phil moved it back to its case and then unloaded the groceries and set to making a meal for them. He made Clint’s favorite thing that he could, a stir-fry with tons of different veggies and chicken. Clint woke up as he was finishing.

“You are the best,” he said, stretching and then wincing.

Phil carried a plate over to him. “Don’t stretch your leg, moron.”

Clint glared at him. “Work on your bedside manner much?”

“Not what you need from me, Barton.”

“What I need from you I can’t have tonight, so what good are you?” Clint said with a wicked grin.

“Sparkling company. What are we watching?” Phil said.

They chose a movie, ate their dinner, and Phil chuckled when Clint fell back asleep with his plate still on his lap. He moved it, cleaned up the kitchen, and then managed to shuffle Clint back to the bedroom for the night.

The next couple of days were a routine of helping Clint get cleaned up, down to SHIELD for physical therapy while Phil worked, and back to the apartment to crash. They were just getting ready to leave for SHIELD one morning later that week when Natasha showed up at Phil’s door looking grave. Phil ushered her in and said, “What’s wrong?”

Clint had graduated to crutches and was just coming down the hall from the bathroom. He stopped when he saw her face. Natasha looked up at him and said, “Barney Barton killed himself. I’m sorry, Clint.”

Clint stood still for a moment and then moved to the table and sat down heavily in a chair, letting his crutches fall to the floor. Phil looked to Natasha. “What happened?” he asked.

Natasha sat down next to Clint. “We don’t know much. The FBI called Fury and I said I’d come tell you. They found him early this morning in his cell. He hung himself, apparently.” She reached across to grasp Clint’s hand, but he pulled away and wrapped his arms around himself protectively.

Phil moved patiently to the kitchen where he filled a glass with ice water and carried it to the table, setting it down near Clint.

He didn’t look up. He was just staring down at his knees.

Clint was quiet for a few minutes. Phil smiled inwardly as Natasha simply fixed herself a cup of hot tea and one for Phil, and then sat down at the table, waiting. She and Phil both knew that words weren’t going to help Clint right now, unless he spoke them.

He did, after about ten minutes of silence.

“When I was seventeen, I’d been with Carson’s circus for seven years. It was Barney’s idea to join, and anything was better than the foster system we were in, so we went. He was looking out for me then. I mean, he beat me up when I screwed up --  it’s all he knew to do about it, but he looked out for me. Carson even told him, when we asked to join, he’d take Barney but not me, and Barney talked him into it. Said I was little enough to train for an act, and he was right. We worked roustabout jobs for a couple of years, and when I was twelve Trick Shot caught me messing around with his bow. He told me he wouldn’t beat the shit out of me if I proved I could use it. I did.”

Clint paused and looked up at Phil, “Someone said it was a gift.” Phil nodded and smiled, remembering the conversation early in Clint’s career when he was uncertain that archery was enough to make him a good agent.

Clint took a deep breath. “Fast forward seven years. Barney never did get into an act, but he was into everything else. He’d officially left the circus, but he still seemed to be around a lot. I knew he was working odd jobs trying to scrape more money together than Carson could offer. I didn’t see him much. One night I was trying to hide out from Trick Shot and Duquesne and I picked the wrong place. I overheard Barney and Trick Shot leading a meeting about stealing from old man Carson.”

Phil didn’t miss the idea that a seventeen year old Clint was trying to hide out from two men, nor did he miss the wrath in Clint’s voice as he mentioned the theft from his boss. He loved Clint for his loyalty sometimes.

“I thought I’d hid well enough, but when I climbed down later they were waiting, Trick Shot and the rest of them. Barney, too.” He took a deep breath. “Trick Shot caught me, and a bunch of them held me down. He said I could join them, but I refused. So Trick Shot started in on me.” He closed his eyes, remembering.

“It was like something snapped that night. Like every time he’d gotten mad before was only the tip. He just kept hitting me. Broke my wrist, broke my hand, generally beat the shit out of me. And then, after all of that, he pulled out a knife and handed it to Duquesne, ordering him to finish me off. Told him to enjoy it, that he deserved the honor since he’d had to put up with me in his act all those years.”

‘Put up with him.’ Phil thought back to Clint’s early days with SHIELD, when other agents complained about him – too cocky, bad at following orders, didn’t trust his team. Well, this explained a lot. Seven years as a main attraction in a circus, the only orders he ever got as a kid ended up with him getting beat up, and the only people he ever had the opportunity to trust tried very hard to kill him over money. Phil “put up with him” and would willingly do so as long as he could.

Clint’s voice got very quiet. “Barney stood and watched the whole time. I was in and out of consciousness after Buck broke my hand, but I could see him standing there. I called out to him, but he ignored me. After Duquesne stabbed me, they left me for dead, every last one of them, including Barney. I didn’t hear from him for a year, until the letter.”

Phil was staring. He knew he was, and so he moved to Clint’s side and crouched down in front of him, putting his hands on Clint’s knees. Clint looked up at him and met his gaze. His voice, when he spoke again, was rough.

“I hated him. But I hated Trick Shot more. He was petty and jealous and dirty and mean. But mostly? Mostly I hated him because he took my brother and showed him the wrong things. Barney wasn’t good to me all that often – he had seen too much and done too much for that – but he used to look out for me. Before.  . . Once he started hanging around Trick Shot he stopped looking out for me. And then he left me for dead with the rest of them. It was dumb luck that one of the roustabouts found me a few minutes after they left. Barney just left me to die.” The last words were choked, and he dropped his head to his chest again.

 He raised his head and looked at Phil and tears were streaming down his face. Phil reached up and put his hand against Clint’s cheek for a moment and Clint leaned into it. After a moment, he stood, and motioned to Natasha to help, and they pulled Clint out of the chair and guided him to the couch, where he sat heavily and leaned forward into his hands.

Phil knew that nothing was clear right now. Clint had killed the man who was responsible for years of abuse, and that had thrown him off. He had lost his hearing, and that had thrown him off. Now he lost his brother, who was as big a rollercoaster of emotion as possible, and that sent him into a tailspin.

Phil sat on one side of Clint and Natasha sat on the other, and they waited for the storm of grief to pass.

Everything probably would have worked out better if Phil and Natasha hadn’t been called away for a three day mission that very afternoon.

Phil was livid, but there was nothing Fury could do about it and even through his haze of anger Phil knew that.

“We didn’t plan it, Phil,” Fury said, pacing his own office. “I know the timing is horrible, but he’s a big kid, he can last a few days without you guys. If he can’t, well, then maybe--”

“Don’t,” Phil said, stepping close to his boss and coming as close to insubordination as he ever had in his career.”You know this isn’t normal and that he’s not weak.”

Fury nodded and folded his arms across his chest. “I know. You should remember that, too. He’ll be okay. PT will keep him busy and I’ll order him to stay here on base so someone can keep an eye on him. You two will be back in three days. I wouldn’t send you if you weren’t absolutely needed, you know.”

Phil sighed and ran his hand over his face. “I know. Sorry, sir. When should we report to the landing pad?”

Fury told him he had two hours, and after cursing his way down the hall outside Fury’s office, he texted Natasha and headed down to PT to tell Clint.

Clint had insisted on coming into the office and keeping their normal routine for the day after he settled down from the news about Barney, and he was sweating his way through a workout with the therapist when Phil entered the gym.  Phil approached and told the therapist to give them ten minutes.

Clint wiped his face with a towel and sat down with a bottle of water on the bench near the wall. Phil sat down next to him.

“You feeling all right?” Phil asked. Clint just shrugged. Phil sighed and clenched his hands together before looking over at Clint again.

“What’s wrong, Phil?” Clint said.

“Natasha and I have to go out on a three-day mission in two hours,” he said, bluntly.

Clint just stared at him for a moment, and then he slammed his water bottle down on the floor in front of him. A few people stared and then looked away as Phil glared at them.

“It’s three days and Fury said we’re the only ones who can do it. I looked over the files and I think he’s right. Not that it makes a difference. We have to go. I’m sorry.”

Clint shook his head. “It’s okay,” he finally said, and Phil thought his voice sounded tight and strained. “I don’t need a babysitter.”

“I wasn’t going to babysit you, Barton,” Phil said, suddenly angry at Clint’s attitude.

Clint looked over at him sharply. “I know. I’m sorry.”

Phil sighed, his anger leaving as quickly as it came. “It’s okay. It’s a crap week.”

“You’re leaving in two hours?” Clint said.

“Yeah. There’s more, okay?” Phil said, and Clint nodded. “I’m asking you to stay here on base while we’re gone. I don’t want you alone in your apartment and Fury said someone from medical would help you when you need it here.”

Clint groaned, and Phil said, “Come on. It’ll make me feel better. You know that.”

“Okay, okay. Fine.”

Phil watched as Clint leaned forward and put his head in his hands. “Hey,” he said, and Clint looked up. “Go get cleaned up and tell medical you got called away for a quick meeting. Then come by my office, okay?” He wasn’t going to walk away from Clint for a three day mission without a proper goodbye.

Twenty minutes later after he’d packed a bag and sat down on the couch in his office to wait, Clint came in on his crutches. His t-shirt wasn’t tucked into his jeans, his hair was tousled, and he was pale and obviously worn out; he just stood inside the door after he closed it behind him.

“I’ll be okay while you’re gone, you know,” he said, quietly.

Phil nodded. “Come, sit.”

Clint shuffled over to the couch, leaned his crutches down to the floor and sat down next to Phil, leaning in on his shoulder with a sigh. Phil reached around his shoulder and drew him into his chest, tightly. He saw Clint fiddle with the hearing aid on his right ear and asked, “Are they working all right?”

“This one bugs the shit out of me, actually,” he replied, taking it out, messing with a setting, and putting it back on. “And yes, I told them about it. I have an appointment tomorrow.”

Phil nodded and then looked over and put his hands on Clint’s cheeks, pulling him in for a kiss. He watched Clint close his eyes and then felt him sag into the kiss, and felt Clint wrap his arms around his back and cling, desperately. Clint’s tongue pressed into Phil’s mouth and felt so good, Clint’s hands on his back steadied his own breathing, and he let Clint explore and caress, and he breathed deeply, savoring the smell of Clint’s aftershave and soap.

Finally, Clint pulled back, running his hand over Phil’s jaw line, pressing his other hand into Phil’s chest and looking steadily into Phil’s eyes before taking a deep, shuddering breath and closing his own eyes, shutting Phil out.

“Clint--“ he said, and the Clint cut him off with another deep kiss, his hands raking through Phil’s hair and running down Phil’s side.

“I don’t – I don’t know what to do,” Clint said, shakily after he pulled away from the kiss.

Phil pressed his forehead against Clint’s. “Go to therapy, do what they tell you, eat, sleep, and do whatever you have to do to get through. We’ll be back soon, okay?”

Clint nodded. “Okay.” He paused. “I hate this.”

“Me, too,” Phil said. And he did. When Clint was feeling insecure he tended to spin out of control, and this week brought all of his insecurities raging forward. Phil knew how to ground him, how to let routine and physical comfort soothe him, but now he couldn’t give it. Now Clint would just spin for three days, and Phil just hoped he didn’t break himself or anyone else while Phil was gone.

 


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three days on his own is harder than it sounded.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to everyone who subsribed, commented, and kept up. I hope the ending is satisfying, although I'll probably play in this section of their lives again sometime. I appreciate the encouragement many of you have given. Thanks to dysprositos for beta skills.

The first night was hard, but Clint was determined to get through. He went back to PT after watching Phil and Natasha leave, and he worked himself as hard as they would let him. He even convinced them to let him go a bit harder on his arms than usual, and he was worn out afterward.

He went back to his room and one of the medics brought him some food so he wouldn’t have to hobble down to the mess hall – it should have been Phil – and he picked at it while reading a book. But he wasn’t very hungry and he couldn’t concentrate on the book, so after throwing the book angrily across the room he fell into bed even though it was early and tried to sleep.

He woke screaming a few hours later.

Flushed and sweating, he carefully got himself dressed and made his way to the common area where the TV was on; another few agents were watching some action flick from the 80s, so Clint parked himself in a chair a bit away from them and tried to get the sounds of Barney’s taunts out of his head.

After the movie one of the other agents actually pulled out the game system and challenged Clint to a round of Call of Duty, which sounded like a great idea until a building exploded in the game and Clint flinched so hard at the sound that he dropped the controller and had to fight to keep his breathing even. He excused himself after that and went back to his room.

He tore out the hearing aids and laid down on the bed with his hands over his eyes, shaking as he kept hearing Buck Chisolm’s laughter and explosions in his head.

He inadvertently fell asleep and woke with a start in the morning. He checked the clock and realized that he was almost late for his first PT appointment of the day. He worked hard again, pushing and pushing until the therapist finally looked at him and said, “You’re going to do more harm than good this way. You’re done for the day.”

He was frustrated. He needed to keep busy and PT was the only thing he was allowed to do besides eat and sleep, and he wasn’t hungry. So he went back to his room and tried to read some more. Sometime later his phone rang.

“Barton,” he answered.

“Agent Barton, this is Agent Ackerman from the FBI,” the voice on the other end of the line said.

“Oh,” Clint said, “Hey.”

“Agent Barton first of all, I’m sorry for your loss,” Ackerman said, obviously as uncomfortable as Clint was with this call.

“Yeah, thanks,” Clint said.

“Agent Barton, we need to know what you’d like to do about a burial, since you’re the only family he had.”

Oh, god. Burial? Only family? Clint didn’t know what to say.

After a long pause, Ackerman tried again. “Agent, I’m sorry if this is difficult. We just didn’t know if you had a preference as to where he was buried. You can also authorize us to handle the matter, if you’d like.”

Handle? “What do you mean, Ackerman?” Clint asked.

“Well, we can have his body cremated and taken care of if you don’t want to be a part of it. We’ll send you the necessary paperwork if that’s what you’d prefer.”

Clint felt like throwing up. To let them handle it seemed best but that’s not what brothers did. You’re supposed to take care of your family. But Barney hadn’t been family for twenty years and even then he was a pretty loose definition of a brother. And Clint didn’t know what to do.

“Agent Barton? Are you all right?” Ackerman said, and obviously Clint had taken too long to answer.

“Yeah, sorry. I just – I hadn’t thought about this,” Clint said.

“Yes, I know it’s been a rough week for you, Agent,” Ackerman said. Clint had to give the guy points for being so nice.

“You know, why don’t you guys handle it, if that’s okay,” Clint finally said.

“Of course. We’ll be sending over a waiver for you to sign, and a copy of the death certificate and a few other things, Agent Barton. As his next of kin you will need to sign over permission to us for dealing with the cremation. Otherwise, thank you for your help; I’m sorry it all turned out this way.”

“Yeah, me, too. But thanks.” Clint hung up. He sat on the edge of his bed and stared blankly at the wall. He didn’t know how long he sat there but then there was a knock on his door. He opened it and a junior agent was standing there with a file folder and a form.

“Sir? The FBI needs you to sign this. I’ll take it for you right away if you’ll sign it. Then this is yours, sir,” the young man handed Clint the folder, the paper, and a pen. He signed quickly and thanked the agent before closing the door and sitting back down on his bed. He turned and emptied the contents of the folder on the bed.

The paper on top was the death certificate, listing suicide as the cause of death. Clint stared at it for a while. Barney Barton, 1969-2009. Suicide.

Guns, murder, arson, kidnapping – those words weren’t on the certificate anywhere.

Clint shuffled through the folder again. There was Barney’s FBI record, his college transcripts, his ARMY release. Papers. A life in a folder. Where were the lights of the carnival? Where were the sounds of the bullets Barney must have put through people’s heads?

He heard the sound of Barney’s voice when he tried to explain to Clint that their parents were dead – a voice blank, uncertain of how sad he should be that the man who beat him regularly and the woman who stood by and watched were dead, and Clint, trying to figure out how he should react, too, mirroring his brother’s blankness.

Barney, who found Clint curled in a ball on the roof of the apartment building where the third foster family lived, wrapping Clint in his eleven-year-old arms and promising to think of something to stop the man from hitting Clint every single night. Promising to get Clint out of there, and Clint didn’t believe him. He didn’t know what believing someone really was but Barney made that promise and then carried it through.

Barney’s voice, trembling with excitement less than a year later when he found Clint hiding on the roof again and telling Clint, “I figured it out! Come on! There’s a circus in town!” Clint not really understanding what good that was going to do until they were standing in front of old man Carson, Barney insisting that Clint was a hard worker just like him and please could they just work for him for food and shelter?

Barney’s face when he watched Clint hit target after target at Trick Shot’s range after only two days of instruction, the face of jealousy and a rage that burned until Clint was finished, after he’d packed up the bow and arrows and wandered out to find Barney and share his glee over his new found skill. Barney beat him so badly that night that Clint couldn’t see properly to practice again for three days, much to Trick Shot’s disappointment.

After that it was just rage and jealousy and arguments and Clint learning to fight back at least a little, long enough to escape to the rafters of the tents and hide, learning to sleep wherever he could so that he was away from Barney or Trick Shot or Duquesne, anyone who might decide that Clint deserved another hit or two.

There was only that, in the end, fighting and hiding in one form or another until Coulson dragged him to SHIELD and taught him what believing in someone _really_ meant.

Clint didn’t know what time it was. He didn’t care, either. He tore the hearing aids from his ears and curled into as much of a ball as his injured leg would let him on the bed.

When he uncurled a few hours later, he decided he had to do something with his body, whether the medical team was happy about it or not. It was evening on the second night, he still had two nights without Phil and Natasha to get through and he wasn’t going to make it if he couldn’t do _something_.

So he pulled his crutches under his arms and went down to the archery range. He dragged a chair onto the range, pulled out his bow and quiver, sat on the chair, and shot.  He emptied the quiver, pulled his crutches back under himself, and slowly and painfully gathered the arrows. He did it again. Even sitting down his leg protested after an hour, and after the second hour he grudgingly had to call it quits.

When he dragged himself back upstairs to his bunk, a meal from medical was there. He ignored it as his eyes fell on the folder on his bed. After he cleaned up a little he threw the folder into the corner of the room and tried to sleep again. Five hours later he was screaming again. Trick Shot was forcing Clint to shoot arrow after arrow into Barney and Barney was screaming at Clint to leave him be.

He couldn’t do this. He had to face another day of PT and boredom with only his memories to keep him company. His hands shook as he dragged clean clothes on and hobbled down to the mess for some coffee. He had a fleeting thought that he hadn’t really eaten much of anything since Phil left, but food sounded awful, so he just drank some coffee and headed to the gym. He watched some people sparring until it was time for his PT appointment.

He made it through therapy, but the lack of food got to him at the end and he dragged himself back to his bunk afterward and found a message from medical there. They wanted him to report to psych the next morning before his therapy appointment. Apparently there was some concern about his adjustment to the week he’d had. He wanted to laugh, but he couldn’t.

One more night. He read a while and then tried to sleep again and woke screaming again, this time only a couple of hours after falling asleep. This time his brain had twisted all the hits and jobs he’d done for SHIELD into illegal acts, and he was a criminal just like Barney. The smell of gunfire seemed real in his room when he woke and he had to get out of there.

There was nowhere he wanted to be, though, so he decided, at three in the morning, to leave. He wasn’t supposed to leave, but he couldn’t be there anymore, so he did. He signed out using Phil’s name and figured he’d be far enough by the time they figured it out that they wouldn’t do anything. He just needed some space and he needed to be somewhere safe. There was really only one place nearby that made him feel safe.

Phil was worn out and he just wanted to see how Clint was doing. Natasha had even given up trying to make conversation on the flight back to headquarters, and when he tried to apologize she just shrugged and said she understood. Neither one of them had slept much in the last three days.

When they arrived at headquarters, Phil headed to Fury’s office for a debrief, and Natasha went to clean up. The debrief took about an hour, and Phil was proud of himself for not asking about Clint at all until they were finished. He was just putting the mission folder away in his briefcase when Fury trumped him.

“Barton’s missing.”

Phil accidentally shut the briefcase on a finger. He yanked it out and said, “What?”

“He didn’t show up for PT today and someone figured out that he signed out in the middle of the night using your name. Rookie got a talking to already, don’t worry.”

Phil swallowed the panic rising in his chest and stood. “Has anyone looked for him?”

  
Fury sighed. “We checked his place and he’s not there. He hasn’t used any bank accounts since he left, hasn’t used his motorcycle or your car, hasn’t logged onto any of his password sites on the Internet, and technically I can’t send a team out before twenty four hours. I’ve done what I could from here, but he’s nowhere obvious.”

“Wait, back up,” Phil said. “He’s been doing what he’s supposed to until last night?”

Fury shrugged. “Sort of.”

“Sir,” Phil said, stepping toward Fury. He didn’t know what he was going to do, but his whole body was tense and he was seconds from incoherent thought.

“Phil, he went to PT until today. They didn’t like what they were seeing, though.”

“What do you mean?”

“He hasn’t been eating, as far as medical knows – they’ve been delivering meals to his room and picking up mostly full trays. Mess hall hasn’t recorded anything, and he showed up to therapy yesterday unprepared for the workout. That’s not like him. Shooting range officer said he took his bow in last night for a couple hours, too.”

“How the hell did he shoot with his bad leg, and who didn’t call medical to tell them what he was trying?” Phil was getting very angry. Apparently his idea of keeping an eye on Clint and SHIELD’s idea of it were very different.

“He dragged a chair in,” Fury said. “Listen, Phil. We noticed a problem and set him up with an appointment with psych for today. He skipped that, too, of course.”

Phil ran a palm over his face. “Okay. You checked his place?”

Fury nodded.

Phil sighed and said, “Okay. May I please have permission to go find Barton?”

“Yes,” Fury said, sitting down behind his desk. “Sorry, Phil. I didn’t think he’d bolt.”

“Yeah,” Phil said. “I’ll keep you posted.”

Phil left Fury’s office, trying very carefully not to slam the door, and called Natasha, asking her to meet him at Clint’s bunk.

When they went in, Natasha looked around but Phil just stood in the center of the small room. He saw the hearing aids laying on the center of the bed and he reached over and picked them up, putting them in his pocket.

Natasha found the folder and papers strewn on the floor in the corner. “Phil, look at this.”

Phil leaned over her shoulder as she shuffled the papers. “They’re all about – shit.” He saw the death certificate. He could picture Clint sitting in the room, exhausted from therapy, and rifling through the black memories of his brother alone.

“Phil,” Natasha said, “They checked Clint’s place, right?”

He nodded.

“Did they check yours?” she said, and he smacked his own forehead and turned, heading down the hallway before she could even shove the papers back in the folder.

“Come on,” he called. “He needs you, too.”

They found him on Phil’s bed curled around a pillow and clenching one of Phil’s sweatshirts in his arms twenty minutes later. Phil wasn’t sure if he was asleep, but his eyes were closed and Phil knew he hadn’t heard them come in, so Phil approached cautiously, pulling the hearing aids out of his pocket. Natasha waited in the doorway.

He knelt down next to the bed and laid his hands gently on the mattress. Clint opened his eyes sluggishly, and when he saw Phil he took a shuddering breath and sat up as Phil climbed onto the bed next to him, pulling Clint into his arms. He looked at Natasha as Clint just broke down and let the tears fall, clearly too tired and strung out to stop them. Natasha looked at Phil questioningly and he nodded, gesturing to a spot on the other side of Clint. She came and sat down, rubbing Clint’s back as he buried his face in Phil’s shoulder.

They sat like that for a long time, but Clint’s tears finally abated, and he tried to sit up. Natasha helped him, and Phil held out the hearing aids. Clint took them, carefully fitting them behind his ears and turning them on.

“Hey,” Phil said.

“Hey,” Clint replied, his voice rough and tired.

“Hey,” Natasha said and they all three smiled. Clint dropped his head to his chest and drew another shaky breath.

“Are you guys okay?” he said, leaving his chin against his chest.

Phil and Natasha looked at each other. “Yeah,” Phil said. “We’re okay. Everything went according to plan.”

“Good,” Clint said. After a pause he added, “Things didn’t go so well with the plan here.”

“Yeah,” Natasha said. “We figured that bit out.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” Phil asked.

Clint was quiet for a minute and then he finally looked up again. “I couldn’t sleep. They called about Barney’s funeral arrangements and I told them to handle it and then nothing tasted right and I couldn’t sleep and I was running on fumes and I kinda lost it and figured this was the safest place to be stupid.”

Phil felt the compliment in his chest, and he pulled Clint into a brief kiss. “You’re going to be okay,” he said, drawing back.

Natasha continued to rub Clint’s back and he leaned into her. She ran her fingers through his hair and he said, desperation seeping into his voice, “Everything’s off kilter. Everything. I can’t find level ground, it’s all off-balance.”

“I know,” Phil said, and he stood, went to the kitchen for some ice water, and came back a minute later. Clint was still leaning into Natasha’s arms, but he sat up and took the water gratefully.

Phil set the glass down for him when he was finished.

“You know,” Phil said as he sat back down on the bed. “We’re here to balance you. That’s kind of our job, I think.”

“Our job?” Natasha said, curious.

“Yeah,” Phil said, and he grasped Clint’s hand in his, rubbing small circles around Clint’s thumb. “Balance. I mean, it’s what you guys do for me, I figure we do it for you, Natasha, and it’s what you need most right now, Clint.”

Clint took a deep breath and rubbed his hand across his face. “Recurve,” he said quietly.

Phil grinned. “Yeah, that’s us. We’re your recurve.”

Clint and Natasha nodded, and Clint pulled her down next to him on the bed, reaching for Phil at the same time. He kicked off his shoes and laid down in front of Clint, so Clint was in the middle. Natasha wrapped her arm around Clint and Phil took his hand.

Phil pressed a kiss to Clint’s forehead. “Sleep. We’ll keep watch.”

Clint nodded and closed his eyes. He was asleep in two minutes. Phil and Natasha stayed with him, falling asleep as well. They slept tangled in each others’ arms through the night and Clint didn’t wake up once.  

 

The End.

 


End file.
